UAE drawing up blacklist of unsafe airlines

The aviation regulator of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is preparing a blacklist of airlines that are to be banned from using airports in the UAE owing to poor safety records or other issues of concern.

The General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) of the United Arab Emirates is making the airline blacklist in its effort to “clean up” the skies over the country after it came to light that at least 6 airline operators banned by the European Union (EU) are regularly using airports in the UAE.

The United Arab Emirates, having 5 international airports, has emerged as a regional hub for several airlines.

Saif al-Suwaidi, director-general of the GCAA, was quoted by the media as saying that the blacklist is being drawn up with a view to “closing a legal loophole” which lets airlines registered abroad to fly in and out of the United Arab Emirates without having to undergo safety inspections. To rectify this, Saif al-Suwaidi added, the UAE has “started cleaning up the market from those who are misusing the open-skies policy.”

The core objectives of the planned blacklist, Saif al-Suwaidi added, will be same as those that led to the ban by the European Union. However, he clarified that the approach by the UAE would be different in that it would be based on “different tools of measurement.”

All the same, the aim of both the EU and the UAE is the same – to ensure “the highest standards of safety and to protect our country,” Saif al-Suwaidi was quoted by the Abu Dhabi-based newspaper The National as saying.

According to him, a date for completion of the list of banned airlines has not yet been decided and that such a task would need considerable investment in terms of resources.

Those airlines banned by the European Union consist of operators of both passenger aircraft and cargo aircraft. And, many of them have been barred from flying over Europe’s airspace owing to “serious safety deficiencies,” the media reports said, citing documents of the European Commission (EC), which is the executive wing of the European Union.

Most of the operators banned by the European Union are registered in countries in Central Asia, South Asia and Eastern Europe. These airlines include Ariana Afghan Airlines (Afghanistan); East Wing (Kazakhstan); Click Airways (Kyrgyzstan); and Cargo Airways (Ukraine).

The United Arab Emirates’ safety clean-up comes a few weeks after a Boeing 707 cargo plane, of Sudan, crashed on October 21, 2009, shortly after it took off  from Sharjah International Airport, in the UAE,  in which all the 6 crew members aboard lost their lives.

Azza Air Transport, owner of the cargo plane that crashed in Sharjah, has been banned from operating in the United Arab Emirates till an investigation into the accident is completed. However, Azza Air Transport has not been banned from flying over the European skies.