DUSHANBE, April 19, Asia-Plus -- The Tajik State Air Company TajikAir today gave a news conference on the rsults of its work in the first quarter of the year.

Speaking to journalists, the TajikAir director general Hokimsho Tilloyev noted that since the beginning of the year, domestic flights have lost more than US$130,000.  The most uprofitable air routes are from Dushnabe to Khorog, Panjakent and Ayni because of the law rate of passneger traffic – not more than 60%-70%. 

According to him, the company covers the losses due to increasing passneger faires on flights to the Russian cities.  

The TajikAir top manager noted that introduction of new rates on flights to the Russian cities in march-June is connected with a seasonal increase in passenger traffic from Dushanbe to Moscow and other Russian cities during this season.  “As far as Russian airlines operating flights to Tajikistan are concerned, they also raise passenger fares, justifying the decision as based on market trends,” Tilloyev said.  

As it had been reported earlier, TajikAir on April 5 raised passenger fares on flights to Moscow by 11 percent for economic class (from $349 to $389) and by 4 percent for business class (from $523 to $544), according to Tajik national air carrier.  

In the meantime, TajikAir in February lowered passenger fares on the route from Moscow to Dushanbe from $289 to $229 for economic class and from $422 to $354 for business class.  

Tilloyev added that negotiations on the possibility of making changes to the Tajik-Russian government-to-government agreement on mutual flights are under way.  “We have proposed to review tariff policy of the companies and increase the number of flights to Russia from 12 per week to 14 per week,” the TajikAir director general said.    

According to Tajik national air carrier, TajikAir now accounts for only 31 percent of air routes from Tajikistan to other countries.  

We will recall that the government on September 6, 2006 passed the resolution “On the State Unitary Enterprise Tojikiston."   The resolution renamed the carrier TajikAir and granted it a new charter.  The resolution allows the company to set flexible fares on international air routes by itself, depending on the season and passenger traffic volume, without consulting the antimonopoly commission