afrol News, 16 July - Angola’s Airliner, TAAG, will re-launch its flight to Portugal in August following the announcement by the European Commission on partial lifting of a ban from accessing the European Airspace, said a news release issued in Luanda on Wednesday.

The Angolan Transport Ministry said TAAG is free to operate ten flights a week under the supervision of the national institutes of civil aviation of both Angola and Portugal.

The statement said TAAG should fully comply with the civil navigation rules, by the European Union Security Committee, which would fully met in November this year to remove the company from the blacklist and enabling it to fly everywhere in Europe.

According to the document, EC recognises the efforts made by TAAG to improve its work to comply with EC security standards, quality and reliability as well as the requirements of the National Institute of Civil Aviation in the last few months, enabling TAAG to obtain the air operator certificate on 28 May.

“As to the process of readmission into the International Air Transportation Association (IATA), TAAG has also passed the IATA Operational Safety Audit test with 100 percent conformity,” the government statement said.

On Tuesday, the European Transport Commissioner, António Tajani said that although the Airliner remained on the EU black list, it was authorised to carry out 10 flights per week to Lisbon, although it remained banned from operating the weekly flight it used to have to Paris.

In April, the EC added Benin in the list of banned flights to 27 member states. The latest blacklist was the tenth update first drawn up by the EU in March 2006 with more than 90 airlines mainly from Africa having been banned.

The ban already covers carriers from nations including Angola, Gabon, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Liberia, Rwanda and other Asian countries.

The EU imposed harsh measures on passenger carriers following airline crashes in 2004 and 2005 that killed hundreds of European travelers.

By staff writer

© afrol News

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