Indonesia-EU air war
Jakarta halts open-skies talks and urges its airlines not to buy Europe-made planes
The Straits Times
RELATIONS between Indonesia and the European Union have nose-dived over aviation.
Jakarta has upped the ante in its dispute with Brussels over the latter's ban on all its airlines flying to and in the continent by asking its own carriers not to purchase aircraft made in Europe.
It has also decided to suspend negotiations with the EU over an open-skies policy until the ban on all its airlines is lifted.
The decision followed last week's cancellation of a trip to Europe – scheduled for early next year – by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, whose presidential aircraft is owned by Garuda. Indonesia's national carrier has been banned from flying to the continent.
Indonesia was upset by the EU's decision to renew the ban on Nov 28 despite Jakarta's repeated appeals that it be lifted. The ban, imposed in July, resulted from safety concerns after a series of air crashes in Indonesia.
Mr Budhi Mulyawan Suyitno, Indonesia's director-general of air transportation, said the country's airlines should not purchase or lease aircraft made in Europe while the ban remains.
'What's the point in purchasing European aircraft when the plane cannot be flown in the continent?' he said at a media briefing on Tuesday.
But analysts say his statement is merely a call on airlines to avoid buying European aircraft and does not amount to a ban itself.
Just last week, Mr Budhi told reporters that the government had decided not to send inspectors to Europe to check and register new aircraft bought by Indonesian airlines.
Instead, he said, registration of such aircraft would have to be done in Jakarta, and Indonesian airlines must make their own arrangements for new jets to be flown to the country.
The new ruling will mean that an airline will have to pay an additional US$200,000 (S$292,000) on each aircraft that has to be flown to Indonesia to be registered.
'This is the cost if an airline still insists on buying aircraft from Airbus,' said Mr Budhi.
The president-director of Garuda, Mr Emirsyah Satar, has said he supports the call by Mr Budhi, adding that the national carrier would reconsider its plans to buy French-made Airbus planes and instead look at American-made Boeing aircraft.
Most Indonesian airlines have American-made aircraft in their fleets, but two carriers – Mandala Airlines and Batavia Air – have signed contracts to buy new aircraft from Europe.
Mandala Airlines has a contract to buy 30 A320s from Airbus while Batavia Air is to get 16 aircraft from Italian-French maker Avions de Transport Regional.
Mr Warwick Brady, managing director of Mandala Airlines, said the new ruling requiring aircraft to be registered in Jakarta would mean extra costs for his company.
But he told Kompas daily it was not possible for the airline to cancel the contract as it had already spent millions of dollars on a deposit for the 30 aircraft.
Instead, Mandala would check with the EU on the reasons for its inclusion on the list of banned airlines.
'Why should our airline be banned if all our aircraft are made in Europe?' he asked.
Other low-cost carriers such as Adam Air and Lion Air are rejuvenating their fleets by buying new aircraft from Boeing.
Separately, Transport Minister Jusman Syafii Djamal has said Jakarta is linking its talks on its open-skies policy with the EU to the European ban on Indonesia airlines.
Speaking to reporters on Tuesday after meeting President Yudhoyono, he said a decision had been made 'to stop all discussions …temporarily before the EU lifts its ban'.
He also said that if Indonesia were to continue negotiations and reach an agreement with the EU, the deal would be unfair to Jakarta because EU airlines would be able to fly to Indonesia while Indonesian carriers would still be banned from Europe.
'The ban is an obstacle to the open-skies policy,' he said.
Mr Jusman added that he was toying with the idea of imposing stringent checks on European airlines flying to Jakarta.
'We want to check because we are curious to know what differentiates them from our Garuda,' he said.
