newstodate.aero

May 28, 2024 (newstodate): Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia's war on Ukraine, transfer traffic played an important role for Riga Airport and airBaltic.
   Russia and Belarus were key markets for airBaltic, generating transfer traffic to and from European destinations. This came to a halt, and the focus has since been for airBaltic to increase in the point-to-point markets instead.
   Now one region is offering potentials for growing the share of transfer traffic again: the ex-Yugoslav countries.
   airBaltic is thus expanding in the region with the launch of year-round flights from Riga to Ljubljana, followed by seasonal flights from Riga to Skopje and Pristina.      
   Already in summer 2023, airBaltic launched seasonal flights from Riga to Belgrade and Tivat, as well as from Tallinn to Dubrovnik and Split, and these flights are now being resumed.
   However, it is not all plain sailing; airBaltic has thus cut short the program for seasonal flights between Riga and Pristina, Kosovo, launched on May 4, 2024.
   Earlier slated for operations till September 28, the operations will now end instead already on August 31, 2024, thus cutting roughly one month of services.
   While no official comments have been made, lack of response in the market seem a plausible cause for the retreat, leaving little hope for a return of service in summer 2024.