OREANDA-NEWS. Georgian airline MyWay Airlines, which began operating flights from Tbilisi to Moscow’s Zhukovsky airport, will have to return about $ 1 million to passengers who cannot use the tickets purchased in advance for flights to Moscow due to a temporary ban imposed by the Russian authorities. This was announced on Monday by MyWay Airlines commercial director Igor Aptsiauri to journalists.

"We will fully refund the money to passengers. This is about $ 1 million, since we had sales open until the end of October. We sold 3.5 thousand segments for the Tbilisi-Zhukovsky flight, and commercially it would be big for us loss", said Atabagi, adding that the airline will look for new markets in Europe and Asia. In addition to MyWay Airlines, another Georgian airline, Georgian Airways, flies to Russian cities. It organizes direct regular flights from Tbilisi to Moscow, St. Petersburg and Kazan.

On June 21, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree according to which from July 8, Russian carriers are temporarily prohibited from conducting their activities. (including commercial) of citizens from the territory of the Russian Federation to the territory of Georgia. On June 22, the Ministry of Transport of the Russian Federation announced that from July 8, flights of Georgian airlines to Russia would be suspended.

Flights will be suspended by all Russian airlines operating regular flights to Georgia: Aeroflot, S7, Ural Airlines, Pobeda, Red Wings and Smartavia.As an alternative, Aeroflot suggested making Yerevan or Vladikavkaz a starting or ending point for a trip. Red Wings had previously planned to open flights to Kutaisi from July 20. The ban on flights to Russia has also spread to Georgian airlines. However, the company Georgian Airways announced its intention to offer its passengers transit flights Tbilisi-Yerevan-Moscow.