Page 50 - IRANRptAug19

placed by Iran’s flag carrier IranAir and other Iranian carriers would be fulfilled once US sanctions did not preclude delivery. The sanctions hit both Boeing and Airbus when it came to business with Iran because they also cover aircraft that are made with a significant level of US components, such as Airbus jets. “These contracts are not cancelled; they are in our portfolio. However, their implementation will be possible only after the lifting of sanctions against Iran by the United States, or if Washington will give separate special permission to supply the aircraft, ” said Dubon.
Iran Air in 2016 signed an agreement with Airbus for the supply of 118 aircraft. It asked for 73 wide-body aircraft and 45 narrow-body planes. The contract included 21 aircraft of the A320ceo family and 24 of the A320neo family.
Also, Airbus received an order for 12 of its largest airliner, the A380, from IranAir.
According to data for the beginning of 2019, IranAir’s fleet features two A310s, 12 A300s, 4 Boeing 747s, 6 A320s and 16 Fokker 100s . Some of these jets are over 40 years old and are only in partial operation due to long-lasting sanctions on the country restricting routes.
Iran appointed a former airforce commander who is on a Washington blacklist as the new chief executive of IranAir on May 6.
Turaj Dehghani Zanganeh replaced Farzaneh Sharafbafi, the first Iranian woman with a PhD in aerospace and the first woman to run the airline. She was at the helm of the airline for two years.
Armenia Airways t his week launched operations with a Yerevan-Tehran service, CAPA – Centre for Aviation reported on June 21.
The carrier, founded in 2016 and based at the Armenian capital’s Zvartnots International Airport, received its first aircraft—an Airbus A310-300—in 2018. It has leased a BAE 146-300 from Romanian airline Aviro Air.
The first service of the airline flies to and from Tehran’s Imam Khomeini International Airport.
9.2.4 Transport corporate news
A new flight connecting Turkey’s business capital Istanbul with Iran’s central desert city of Kerman is set to launch, ILNA reported on June 26. Though airlines around the globe have generally wound down flights to Iran in the face of the US sanctions regime directed at the country and companies that do business with it, Turkish carriers including flag carrier Turkish Airlines and low-cost operator Pegasus continue to run connections with Iran. Both airlines are believed to have access to Iran’s advantageous official forex rate for payments in the Iranian rial (IRR). In the face of US sanctions, the IRR has lost around 65% of its value against the US dollar, a big difficulty for international enterprises relying on rial revenues.
The new service will be run by Turkish Airlines, according to Kerman’s governor Javad Fadaei. He did not specify whether the new flight will use the new $11bn Istanbul Airport , a mega airport which is now the flag carrier’s main hub.
Fadaei added that the Kerman-Istanbul flight would make a positive impact on the development of Kerman province across various fields, helping to create “opportune conditions for investment”.
News of the flight follows Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s official inauguration of the Salam Terminal at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini International Airport .
50 IRAN Country Report August 2019 www.intellinews.com