KATHMANDU, Dec 9: The European Union (EU) has declined to remove Nepali airlines from its prohibition order lists, preventing them from operating in European airspace stating that they still fail to meet the international safety standards.
Although the EU has downsized the number of airline operators in its prohibition list to conduct their flights in European airspace, Nepal has hasn’t been removed from the blacklist. Making public its updated lists, the EU has banned 97 airplane operators, down from 103 earlier.
EU continues blacklisting Nepali airlines
All airlines from 15 countries now make up most of the EU’s blacklist. The countries are Afghanistan, Angola, Armenia, Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, Djibouti, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Kyrgyzstan, Liberia, Libya, Nepal, São Tomé and Príncipe, Sierra Leone and Sudan, according to the EU.
In this regard, the EU has mentioned the names of 20 Nepali airline companies in its prohibition lists. “These bans are due to inadequate safety oversight by the aviation authorities of these nations,” the EU Commission says on its website.
For the first time, the EU banned the Nepali airlines from flying in its airspace on December 5, 2013. Although government officials have been reiterating that they have been putting in full efforts to remove the Nepali airlines from the EU’s blacklist, the efforts haven’t materialized so far.
