Planes that are not authorized by Somali Federal Govt cannot land in Somaliland airports or use Somalia/Somaliland airspace

[Deeq A.]

MOGADISHU– The Somali Federal Government has issued a circular that planes that do not have an authorization from the Federal Govt cannot land in airports in Somaliland.

The Federal Govt has said that planes that do not have an authorization cannot also use the Somalia/Somaliland airspace.

The General Manager of Somalia’s Civil Aviation and Weather Forecasting Agency, Hon. Yusuf Abdi Abdile alias Yusuf Jaale has said that the takeover of the airspace by Somali Federal Government from ICAO has been smoothly taking place for the past December, 2017 and the instrument for managing Somalia’s airspace has been relocated to Mogdishu, from Nairobi.

Somaliland and Somalia are locked horns with each other over who is authorized to control the airspace although both sides met in Istanbul and reached an accord to administer the airspace from Mogadishu and Hargeisa. It is not obvious what action is Somaliland going to take as far as the airspace row is concerned. There are 12 routes used by airlines while Somalia administers only 7.