Azur Air denies plans to re-register aircraft in Turkey

MOSCOW. March 9 (Interfax) - Azur Air dismissed media reports that it planned to re-register its fleet in Turkey.

"Azur Air denies reports about possible registration of its aircraft in other countries. The airline company is in close contact with lessors and hopes the situation will be settled," a company spokesperson told Interfax on Wednesday.

"Additionally, Azur Air is continuing to register its aircraft in Russia. The Russian registry already registered four our aircraft: three Boeing 767-300s and one Boeing 757-200. The airline company intends to get more registered in Russia soon," he said.

Azur Air is one of Russia's largest airlines by passenger traffic and operates flights commissioned by tour operators. Its strategic partner is Anex Tour, to which Azur Air is affiliated via the One2Fly limited liability company.

Earlier, a source told the TourDom.ru portal that Russian airline companies affiliated to Turkish tour operators planned to re-register their aircraft in Turkey. The source named primarily Azur Air, Royal Flight and Nordwind, which operate charter flights for Anex Tour, Coral Travel and Pegas Touristik. Such re-registration is necessary to move aircraft, most of which are registered in Bermuda and Ireland, from under Western sanctions to enable airlines to continue to fly abroad at no risk of having their fleets impounded.