International airlines which conducting operations to the Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA), Katunayake had refused to continue their operations to the country's second international airport, Mattala Mahinda Rajapaksa International Airport (MRIA) due to the lmited number of passengers and bird strikes, Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) investigating allegations of fraud and corruption at SriLankan Airlines, SriLankan Catering and Mihin Lanka (Pvt.) Ltd. learnt yesterday.
It was highlighted that these international airlines had refused to conduct operations to Mattala despite the special privileges granted to them.
The Director, Air Transport and Economic Regulations of the Civil Aviation Authority Rehan Wanniappa testified before the Commission yesterday.
In the international civil aviation industry, there are about nine traffic rights commonly known as the freedoms of the air. These freedoms are a set of commercial aviation rights granting a country's airlines the privilege to enter another country's airspace, formulated as a result of disagreements over the extent of aviation liberalization in the Convention on International Civil Aviation of 1944, known as the Chicago Convention.
When a country signs an Open-Skies Agreement, a bilateral agreement with another country on commercial aviation, these rights are concerned. Especially, the first five rights are commonly concerned than the rest four.
These rights include 1. The right to fly over a foreign country without landing, 2. The right to refuel or carry out maintenance in a foreign country without embarking or disembarking passengers or cargo, 3. The right to fly from one's own country to another country, 4. The right to fly from another country to one's own, 5.The right to fly between two foreign countries on a flight originating or ending in one's own country, 6.The right to fly from a foreign country to another while stopping in one's own country for non-technical reasons, 7. The right to fly between two foreign countries, where the flights do not touch one's own country, 8. The right to fly inside a foreign country, continuing to one's own country, and 9. The right to fly within a foreign country without continuing to one's own country.
However, it was revealed before the Commission that international airlines had refused to operate to Mattala despite they been given all nine freedoms by Sri Lanka. Receiving all nine freedoms would be a great benefit to an airline to conduct operations, but for Mattala, it had not been applicable.
It was also revealed that flydubai, the only international airline which operated to Mattala had ceased operations in 2018 considering the unprofitability and the increasing number of bird strikes at the airport and its vicinity.
Through the Open Skies Agreement with Dubai, Sri Lanka had granted them seven Dubai - Colombo flight frequencies a week and another seven Dubai - Mattala (via Colombo) flight frequencies a week. But, flydubai wanted to terminate flights to Mattala due to the less number of passengers.
"Although we gave them another seven flight frequencies with the request of not terminating the flights to Mattala, they terminated the Mattala operations," the witness told the Commission.
It was also revealed that even the national carrier, SriLankan Airlines did not fly to Mattala.
Bird strikes at the airport can damage the aircraft, its engine and sometimes cause injuries to the passengers. Therefore, the airlines are reluctant to fly to such airports where the bird strikes are taken place.
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