Indonesia hopeful EU will lift ban on its airlines by next January
29 Nov 2007
Jakarta: Indonesian presidential spokesman, Dino Patti Djalal, has said that he was optimistic the European Union (EU) would lift its ban on Indonesian airline flights in its air space given the intensive and sustained lobbying the government had done with the European Commission.
"The government is continuing it's lobbying to ensure that a technical meeting next January will produce a positive decision for Indonesia," Dino said.
The European Union has banned a large number of Indonesian airlines from flying in the air space of 29 European countries from July this year.
For a period of a week, early this month, a EU auditor's team observed aviation conditions, as they prevailed in Indonesia, and had its findings evaluated by the European Commission on November 19-22, 2007. Though the Commission has allowed a number of other banned airlines to fly over its airspace again, Indonesian national airlines continued to be on the banned list.