Moldova axes plan to resume Russia-bound flights

MOSCOW (AFP): The national air carrier of Ukraine’s neighbour Moldova has cancelled plans to resume Russia-bound flights, it said.

Air Moldova had announced on Friday that it would resume flights to Russia, which were halted over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

But in a statement late Sunday it said that “Moldova’s civil aviation authority published an operational directive… prohibiting national companies to carry out flights in Russia’s air space.”

“As a result Air Moldova will not be able to assure flights between Chisinau and Moscow as announced earlier,” it said.

Before the Russian invasion, Air Moldova ran routes to Russia’s capital Moscow, its second city Saint Petersburg and the city of Krasnodar in the south.

Moldova closed the country’s airspace on February 24, the same day Russian troops entered Ukraine, Moldova’s neighbour to the east. It was reopened on March 21.

Moldova, a country of 2.6 million people wedged between Romania and Ukraine, was in late June granted EU candidate status.

However, the process of its accession to the bloc could take many years.