(Reuters) – Canada ordered two Russian flights out of its airspace on Monday after the aircraft, which identified themselves as “humanitarian” flights, violated a ban on Russian aircraft, air-traffic control service said.
Canada banned Russian planes from entering its airspace starting on Sunday as part of severe sanctions imposed on Moscow in response to its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
But the same day, an Aeroflot flight AFL111 violated the ban after declaring itself as a humanitarian flight. Under normal circumstances, Canada’s air-traffic control service NAV CANADA does not have the authority to deny airspace access to an aircraft declaring itself a humanitarian flight.
The other Russian plane that attempted to enter Canadian airspace had departed from U.S. airports.
NAV CANADA along with regulator Transport Canada has issued a directive to all air traffic control units to deny all identifiable Russian airplanes access to their airspace. The only exception to this ban is a prior approval by Transport Canada.
Incase of another violation, NAV CANADA will direct the offending airplane to the closest airport and notify the regulator, to be immediately reported to Canada’s Air Defense Sector and the regulator.
(Reporting by Rachna Dhanrajani and Denny Thomas; Editing by Michael Perry)
