Somalia today warned the Ethiopian airline. Civil aviation authority of Somalia wrote a letter to the Ethiopian airline on Wednesday.
“It has come to our attention that, instead of addressing the sovereignty issues outlined in our letter, Ethiopian Airlines has made adjustments to its flight operations by removing references to Somali destinations and retaining only Airport Codes. This action exacerbates the original concerns and undermines the sovereignty of Somalia. Furthermore, we have received an increasing number of unacceptable complaints from the Somali public regarding their travel experiences with Ethiopian Airlines.
We must emphasize that if these issues are not resolved by 23rd August 2024, the SCAA will have no choice but to suspend all Ethiopian Airlines flights to Somalia, effective from that date. This would result in the cessation of Ethiopian Airlines’ services to Somalia,” the civil aviation authority of Somalia said.
The civil aviation authority of Somalia warned the Ethiopian airline by saying, “Failure to address these concerns within the given deadline will compel us to take further action, including the suspension of flights. Any future recurrence, such as not properly identifying the destinations in Somalia, will result in suspension without further warning.”
In another related development, the civil aviation authority of Somalia gave a similar warning to FlyDubai asking the UAE-based airline to use correct representation of flight destinations. The Civil Aviation Authority of Somalia wants Ethiopian airline and FlyDubai to show Hargeisa airport of Somaliland as part of Somalia. Somaliland is internationally recognized part of Somalia but it wants to gain recognition as an independent country.
Last month, Eritrea announced a ban on Ethiopian airline flights starting from September 30. It seems that Somalia could follow in the footsteps of Eritrea to ban Ethiopian airline flights. The decisions by Eritrean and Somalia’s civil aviation authorities seem to be political. Ethiopia and Somalia have been locked in a dispute since January this year over a controversial MoU signed by Ethiopia and Somaliland. Leaders of both Somalia and Eritrea are on good terms, but they are at odds with Ethiopian PM Abiy Ahmed.
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