Reporting by Tareq Haj Bakri
(Zaman Al Wasl)- The regime government issued a decision recently prohibiting the landing of all civilian airplanes in Hmeymim international airport and its transition into a military airport.
Sources confirmed that the prohibition decision came based on instructions from the Russian forces controlling the airport with the aim of limiting use of the airport to Russian forces in addition to some regime military airplanes which the Russian forces oversee and which operate under their command.
The decision has deprived thousands of passengers from the Syrian coast the option of travelling by air to Damascus or abroad.
The Russian forces took Hmeymim airport as a military airbase for it since the start of its air intervention to the advantage of the al-Assad regime in September 2015 where it enjoys control and security supervision over the airport.
Airforce officers behind the airport closure
Thousands of Syrian passengers must now travel by land from the provinces of Latakia and Tartus to Damascus international airport or to the international airport in Beirut to broad flights to their foreign destinations despite the existence of an airport close to the city of Jablah which saved them effort and money.
Hmeymim is considered the safest airport in Syria as it is located in a regime controlled part of the Syrian coastal area away from opposition controlled areas and no missiles or rockets come close to it.
The page, ‘Fighting Corruption in Latakia’ asked who benefited from the airport closure and who stands behind it, and the page attributed the issue to corrupt powerful actors and air force intelligence officers who are responsible for managing airports, who benefit from their connections with particular companies that continue to land and take off from Damascus airport or Beirut international airport.
Depriving the Treasury of Millions of Dollars
The airport closure to civilian airlines has deprived the Syrian airline from millions of dollars due to most passengers heading to Beirut airport because it is safer, closer, and involves less waiting time than Damascus airport.
Pro-regime supporters consider the airport closure part of an economic war waged against the coast by authorities they describe as the “regime’s Daesh” based on what has been posted on several pro-regime pages such as Samer al-Ali’s page who posted the following, “if our Daesh people could move the port they would have moved it.
They want to constrict the siege on us for us to leave, as if we have not provided anything for this country, is it not enough that our youths are the fuel of the war and its tools, without them the opposition would have taken control of the country a long time ago. They should respect our dead, we want them to back off from us.”
From another side, regime authorities attributed the closure to the Russian air force control over the airport and its environs, and their transforming it into the Russian command headquarters in the air. They also mentioned the small size of the airport, its limited run ways which prevented it being used for civilian air carriers, and it remains limited to military fighterjets that are taking off intensively around the clock to achieve “military tasks” around Syrian, according to the statement of an authority in the executive office in Latakia province.
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