...

Iran to reuse 100 grounded airplanes as sanctions on aviation industry lifted

Business Materials 24 November 2013 17:07 (UTC +04:00)

Baku, Azerbaijan, Nov. 24

By Fatih Karimov - Trend: Iran will reuse 100 grounded airplanes as lifting sanctions on its aviation industry enables the country to provide spare parts for the planes, the Tasnim News Agency quoted Hamidreza Ghavabesh, the secretary of the Iranian air travel agencies, as saying on November 24.

The possibility for importing spare parts for the grounded aircrafts will enable us to reuse many of them, he added.

Iran and six world powers reached a breakthrough deal early in Geneva on Sunday on Tehran's nuclear program. The two sides have signed a joint "plan of action".

Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said that based on the deal deals in Geneva, the P5+1 has pledged to not impose additional sanctions against Iran during the next six months and would suspend some existing sanctions.

Iranian airlines' air fleet is averagely 22 years old and the fleet is not efficient. So, they take longer time to get overhauled, he explained.

Certainly, importing parts for repairing and maintaining planes will greatly help improve safety of flights, he noted.

On September 1, Managing Director of Iran Airtour Airline Sirous Baheri said that over 60 per cent of Iran's total 220 airplanes are grounded due to technical and logistic issues.

"Iranians airlines are facing great losses due to the low price of domestic flights' tickets," Baheri said.

"Iranian airlines are currently having difficulties to compete with the foreign airlines," he added.

"Not having connection with the manufacturers is one of the main problems of the domestic airlines, which has made it difficult for them to repair their airplanes," Baheri stated.

Latest

Latest