The Serbian Civil Aviation Directorate has, as of today, banned Montenegro Airlines from operating flights to Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport after Montenegro excluded Serbia from a list of countries with which it will reopen its borders from June 1. The Montenegrin government announced on Monday it would permit the entry of nationals from European countries which have no more than 25 active coronavirus Covid-19 patients per 100.000 inhabitants. The list comprises of nine nations, among which are Croatia, Slovenia and Albania, but does not include neighbouring Serbia or Bosnia and Herzegovina. Serbia has labelled the decision as political. Montenegro declared itself Europe’s first “covid free” state as the country has no active coronavirus cases.
Serbia has lifted entry restrictions and requirements for all nationals. The Serbian Civil Aviation Directorate said the principle of reciprocity has been “seriously violated” by Montenegro’s decision and would negatively impact on the operations of airlines registered in Serbia, hence it has taken the decision to bar Montenegro Airlines from operating to Belgrade. The Montenegrin Ambassador to Serbia, Tarzan Milošević, said the list of countries with which Montenegro plans to reopen its borders in just a few days’ time is yet to be finalised, fuelling hope the spat between the two neighbours may be resolved sooner rather than later.
Montenegro Airlines is currently grounded due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Yesterday morning the carrier said it expects to resume operations during the first half of June and would initially only operate flights from Podgorica and Tivat to Belgrade, with the remainder of its network to be reinstated later on. Following the Serbian Directorate’s decision yesterday evening, the Montenegrin carrier said, “The industry in which we operate should be free of politics. Despite this unexpected decision from Belgrade, Serbia remains part of our future plans”. Montenegro Airlines operated two charter flights to the Serbian capital over the last two days carrying Montenegrin university students studying in Serbia, returning to sit their exams. Air Serbia plans to resume flights from Belgrade to Podgorica and Tivat on June 7.
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how stupid those political games are
Now that Russians are urged to stay home for the summer, I would expect that MNE is desperate for those Serbia flights/tourists, but seems that no.
To the contrary, Ju would probably target also Montegrin citizens as transfer pax. So while for Montenegro Airlines flying to BEG, given the list of citizens that can enter Montenegro, has little point, it could be different for Ju.
Serbians can't enter Monetenegro, but Montenegrin passport holders can enter Serbia. This is already not fair. And as a cherry on the cake YM should make money on passengers they bring to BEG? Not really.
This was also really bad PR for Montenegro as these days there is a big media campaign about the opening of the border with Hungary and the solution for summer holidays in Greece. Just as MNE announced that they won't be letting Serbs in, Greece announced that Serbs can come starting from June 20.
At the end of the day, Serbian tourists will just go elsewhere (mostly Greece) so they won't be as affected. On the other hand, what will hotel, restaurant, shop... owners do without Serbian visitors? We are not only talking about those who stay in hotels, there are many who own properties down there and who come more often and spend more money especially outside holiday hotspots.
For example, last June TIV-BEG was the second busiest route after TIV-DME (which won't happen either this year). Third busiest destination was TGD-BEG.
TIV-DME 57.998
TIV-BEG 28.749
TGD-BEG 28.399
The first non-Russian/Serbian destination was TGD-IST in seventh position with just 12.510 passengers.
Please disregard the source (I know) but the numbers are extremely interesting. Last summer, more than 850.000 Serbs went for summer holidays where they spent over €600.000.000! Most popular was Greece with 610.000 followed by Turkey and Egypt.
According to YUTA these were the most popular destinations for Serbian holidaymakers in 2019:
Greece 610.000
Turkey 75.000
Egypt 35.000
Italy 30.000
Spain 25.000
Before corona, outbound tourism growth was expected to be around 10% meaning these numbers would have been even more impressive.
https://informer.rs/vesti/drustvo/462161/srbi-ovog-leta-moru-potrosili-600-000-000-evra-rekordna-potrosnja-nasih-turista-tokom-letovanja
ju has something like 15% to montenegro
Now even that route won't bring anything good.
Same with JU starting flights to some regional airports for dates they unilaterally declared, when some of these airports are still closed and it unknown when they will open.
And you assume the entry list will not be extended with time.
Most of the passengers are P2P on this route, transfers from Montenegro through Belgrade would not be sufficient to sustain this route.
Which is why I wrote that many who go down there own property or know someone who does. Many go twice during summer which most likely won't be the case this year. Serbian tourists in MNE are different than those that go elsewhere. The YUTA list is good because it shows that attracting Serbian tourists can be a lucrative business. Such moves by MNE government are the exact opposite but we all know why.
Greetings from Poland to all exYu!
First. Montenegro made an entry decision based on number of active CONFIRMED Covid19 cases. Some countries, like Albania, may have low Covid19 numbers just thanks to testing too few people. None knows how many actual cases are there. Anywhere in the world. And I also largely doubt it is the case with "corona free" Montenegro.
Second, as stated in the article, the official reason of breaching the free travel agreement. There are also untold reasons, such as the money YM owes to BEG, and perhaps even to Jat Tehnika or some other businesses in Serbia. They are lucky they never got their aircraft in BEG seized on ground of outstanding payments. It is also a political decision to tolerate all this. So they have no right to moan.
Taj debalans bi stavio Montenegro u prednost i faktički neravonopravan položaj ako gledamo komercijalni aspekt odnosa. Na primer, Montenegro bi imao prednost u odnosu na Er Srbiju jer bi imao ranije letove i bolji red letenja za deo lokalnog tržišta koje bi moglo da putuje a koji po principima poslovne konkurencije dve kompanije dele.
https://www.b92.net/biz/vesti/srbija.php?yyyy=2020&mm=05&dd=27&nav_id=1688379
Plus, the cases in Serbia are minimal just like it is in the rest of the countries in the region.
Recent moves exclude this option. Friendly merger or takover is not moving forward in a climate of mutual bans. Perhaps Air Serbia was never really interested in YM, or they were interested but Montenegro turned them down. Either way, now we know this is not moving forward.