European plane maker Airbus followed its US counterpart Boeing in suspending sale of parts and support services to airline customers in Russia.
This comes as the impact of economic sanctions on Moscow over its military offensive in Ukraine reverberates through the global aviation industry.
"In line with international sanctions now in place, Airbus has suspended support services to Russian airlines, as well as the supply of spare parts to the country," an Airbus spokesman said on Wednesday.
"As always, we comply with all export control regulations and applicable laws."
The Toulouse-based company said it was closely monitoring the situation along with its customers and suppliers. It expressed concern about the security situation "deteriorating so rapidly in Europe", but said that it was "premature" to comment about the impact of sanctions on the industry.
Meanwhile, Chicago-based Boeing, which has long-term partnerships with Russia in areas of aviation, metallurgy, space, engineering and information technology, has also taken similar measures.
"We have suspended major operations in Moscow and temporarily closed our office in Kyiv. We are also suspending parts, maintenance and technical support services for Russian airlines," a Boeing spokeswoman said.
"As the conflict continues, our teams are focused on ensuring the safety of our teammates in the region."
More than a dozen countries have banned Aeroflot and Russian-owned or chartered jets from their airspace, while the European Commission moved to prohibit the sale of parts and services to Russian airlines.
"We are making it impossible for Russia to … repair and modernise its air fleet; and to access many important technologies it needs to build a prosperous future," Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, said on Tuesday.
"We have closed our skies to Russian aircraft, including the private jets of oligarchs."
The latest moves will leave Russia's commercial aviation sector increasingly disconnected and isolated from the global industry, which will have a major impact given its dependence on western suppliers, analysts say.
"Russian fleets have been largely rejuvenated using western aircraft over the past several decades. As the numbers of Iluyshins and Tupolevs fade, Airbus and Boeing jetliners fill the void," George Ferguson, senior aerospace analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence, said.
"The most produced Russian plane in recent times is the regional Sukhoi Superjet 100, sized at about 100 seats, but it's had reliability issues."
Sanctions would ultimately hurt Russian airlines' ability to maintain fleets, he said.
"Most challenging would be engine components, with the largest power-plants in service built by CFM (the GE-Safran joint venture) for Boeing 737s and Airbus A320s, and the V2500 (on A320s) from the Raytheon Technologies (Pratt and Whitney) and MTU joint venture," Mr Ferguson said.
Boeing's 737 Max deliveries could be "hamstrung" after sanctions, as the plane comprises the majority of the Russian airlines' order book, and deliveries have been suspended while awaiting regulator approval to operate again, Mr Ferguson said, following a ban on the jet model after two fatal accidents.
More than half of the active commercial aircraft fleet based in Russia are leased aircraft, many of which are managed by lessors based outside the Russian Federation, consultancy IBA said in a report examining which aircraft leasing companies were likely to be most at risk as a result of the conflict and ongoing sanctions.
"AerCap is likely to be the most exposed to hard-hitting economic sanctions, with 152 active, parked and stored aircraft across Russia and Ukraine," IBA said.
"This high number of aircraft is largely driven by AerCap’s acquisition of GECAS in late 2021."
Russian state leasing company GTLK has the second-largest fleet of aircraft hit by the sanctions, which is made up of a mix of commercial jets and helicopters. The GTLK fleet includes the Russian-built Sukhoi Superjet 100 regional airliner. Sanctions against VEB Leasing were announced by Washington in 2020, joining existing sanctions from the UK.
Airbus and Boeing are also among a growing list of western companies ranging from Apple and Exxon Mobil to BP, Shell and Norway's Equinor ASA that have halted business or announced plans to abandon their Russia operations.
The punitive measures by the US and EU have hit Russian economy hard. But they have not placed sanctions on Russia’s energy and commodity industries, which are integral to the global economy. Russia is among the world's biggest producers of oil and natural gas, in addition to nickel, aluminium, palladium, cobalt, copper, wheat and barley.
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Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
- George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
- Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
- Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Attacks on Egypt’s long rooted Copts
Egypt’s Copts belong to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, with Mark the Evangelist credited with founding their church around 300 AD. Orthodox Christians account for the overwhelming majority of Christians in Egypt, with the rest mainly made up of Greek Orthodox, Catholics and Anglicans.
The community accounts for some 10 per cent of Egypt’s 100 million people, with the largest concentrations of Christians found in Cairo, Alexandria and the provinces of Minya and Assiut south of Cairo.
Egypt’s Christians have had a somewhat turbulent history in the Muslim majority Arab nation, with the community occasionally suffering outright persecution but generally living in peace with their Muslim compatriots. But radical Muslims who have first emerged in the 1970s have whipped up anti-Christian sentiments, something that has, in turn, led to an upsurge in attacks against their places of worship, church-linked facilities as well as their businesses and homes.
More recently, ISIS has vowed to go after the Christians, claiming responsibility for a series of attacks against churches packed with worshippers starting December 2016.
The discrimination many Christians complain about and the shift towards religious conservatism by many Egyptian Muslims over the last 50 years have forced hundreds of thousands of Christians to migrate, starting new lives in growing communities in places as far afield as Australia, Canada and the United States.
Here is a look at major attacks against Egypt's Coptic Christians in recent years:
November 2: Masked gunmen riding pickup trucks opened fire on three buses carrying pilgrims to the remote desert monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor south of Cairo, killing 7 and wounding about 20. IS claimed responsibility for the attack.
May 26, 2017: Masked militants riding in three all-terrain cars open fire on a bus carrying pilgrims on their way to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor, killing 29 and wounding 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.
April 2017: Twin attacks by suicide bombers hit churches in the coastal city of Alexandria and the Nile Delta city of Tanta. At least 43 people are killed and scores of worshippers injured in the Palm Sunday attack, which narrowly missed a ceremony presided over by Pope Tawadros II, spiritual leader of Egypt Orthodox Copts, in Alexandria's St. Mark's Cathedral. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks.
February 2017: Hundreds of Egyptian Christians flee their homes in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, fearing attacks by ISIS. The group's North Sinai affiliate had killed at least seven Coptic Christians in the restive peninsula in less than a month.
December 2016: A bombing at a chapel adjacent to Egypt's main Coptic Christian cathedral in Cairo kills 30 people and wounds dozens during Sunday Mass in one of the deadliest attacks carried out against the religious minority in recent memory. ISIS claimed responsibility.
July 2016: Pope Tawadros II says that since 2013 there were 37 sectarian attacks on Christians in Egypt, nearly one incident a month. A Muslim mob stabs to death a 27-year-old Coptic Christian man, Fam Khalaf, in the central city of Minya over a personal feud.
May 2016: A Muslim mob ransacks and torches seven Christian homes in Minya after rumours spread that a Christian man had an affair with a Muslim woman. The elderly mother of the Christian man was stripped naked and dragged through a street by the mob.
New Year's Eve 2011: A bomb explodes in a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria as worshippers leave after a midnight mass, killing more than 20 people.
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7.05pm: Meydan Sprint (TB) | Group 2 | $250,000 (Turf) | 1,000m
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Winner: Muntazah, Jim Crowley, Doug Watson
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More from Neighbourhood Watch
Recycle Reuse Repurpose
New central waste facility on site at expo Dubai South area to handle estimated 173 tonne of waste generated daily by millions of visitors
Recyclables such as plastic, paper, glass will be collected from bins on the expo site and taken to the new expo Central Waste Facility on site
Organic waste will be processed at the new onsite Central Waste Facility, treated and converted into compost to be re-used to green the expo area
Of 173 tonnes of waste daily, an estimated 39 per cent will be recyclables, 48 per cent organic waste and 13 per cent general waste.
About 147 tonnes will be recycled and converted to new products at another existing facility in Ras Al Khor
Recycling at Ras Al Khor unit:
Plastic items to be converted to plastic bags and recycled
Paper pulp moulded products such as cup carriers, egg trays, seed pots, and food packaging trays
Glass waste into bowls, lights, candle holders, serving trays and coasters
Aim is for 85 per cent of waste from the site to be diverted from landfill
'Unrivaled: Why America Will Remain the World’s Sole Superpower'
Michael Beckley, Cornell Press
Tearful appearance
Chancellor Rachel Reeves set markets on edge as she appeared visibly distraught in parliament on Wednesday.
Legislative setbacks for the government have blown a new hole in the budgetary calculations at a time when the deficit is stubbornly large and the economy is struggling to grow.
She appeared with Keir Starmer on Thursday and the pair embraced, but he had failed to give her his backing as she cried a day earlier.
A spokesman said her upset demeanour was due to a personal matter.
Global state-owned investor ranking by size
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United States
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China
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UAE
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Japan
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Norway
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Canada
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Singapore
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Australia
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