A growing number of countries announced on Sunday that they would close their airspace to Russian aircraft in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Ursula von der Leyen, the chairman of the European Union commission, said the EU would ban all Russian aircraft after Canada and several European countries such as Belgium, Denmark, France and Italy announced similar decisions on Sunday.
“There is no room in Dutch airspace for a regime that applies unnecessary and brutal violence,” said the Dutch Minister of Infrastructure, Mark Harbers. said on Twitter on Sunday.
As more and more airspace was closed to Russian aircraft, the United States said citizens should consider leaving Russia immediately through commercial options still available.
Low-cost Hungary-based airline Wizz Air also said on Sunday it would cancel its flights to Russia for at least a week. The airline said it would not have access to spare parts for its aircraft in Russia due to sanctions imposed on Russia by the European Union and the United States.
Britain has banned all flights operated by Russian airline Aeroflot from its airspace and German airline Lufthansa said on Saturday it would not use Russian airspace for the next week.
Germany banned Russian aircraft, excluding humanitarian flights, from its airspace from Sunday for the next three months. At least a dozen other European countries had closed their airspace to Russian planes this week.
In response to the measures, the Russian government has banned flights from several European countries and S7, Russia’s second largest airline, has suspended its flights to Europe.
