News / Niger putsch restricts air cargo flows to and from West Africa

Air France today announced the suspension of flights to Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso, in West Africa, following the closure of Niger’s airspace by the new ruling junta – a move set to have a significant knock-on effect on belly cargo to and from the region.

“Due to the putsch in Niger and the closure of airspace and Niamey-Diori Hamani Airport, Air France will no longer be serving Niamey until further notice”, an Air France spokesperson confirmed. Flights to Bamako (Mali) and Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso) will be suspended until 11 August, it added.

Air France has also cancelled flights to Paris from Lagos (Nigeria), Yaoundé (Cameroon) and Abidjan (Ivory Coast) as a matter of urgency, as well as diverted flights from Johannesburg and Nairobi to Abidjan (Ivory Coast) and turned back a flight en route to Libreville (Gabon).

The French carrier has warned that “longer flight times” to and from several sub-Saharan destinations were to be expected, some two hours longer than normal.

An Air France KLM Martinair Cargo official confirmed to The Loadstar that the carrier did not operate freighters into and out of West and Central Africa. “Our African freighter ops focus on KLM/Martinair into Nairobi, Johannesburg and Harare (Zimbabwe). We are encountering some overfly constraints (on this service), and are looking into alternative routings,” the official said.

And Lufthansa Cargo told The Loadstar that while it no longer operated freighters to destinations in West and Central Africa, it did market belly capacity on passenger aircraft, including on Brussels Airlines’ flights, part of the Lufthansa Group.

As a precautionary measure, an embargo on shipments from Brussels to N’djili International Airport (FIH) in Kinshasa (Democratic Republic of Congo) in effect immediately, the spokesperson said, adding: “We have flights operated by A321 freighters to destinations in Northern Africa, which are not affected by the air space closure in Niger.”

Other airlines have also diverted certain routes in the region. Air Belgium’s flight from Brussels to Johannesburg and the Turkish Airlines flight from Lagos to Istanbul diverted to the west of Niger to avoid its airspace. British Airways, Virgin Atlantic and Swiss have also changed the routes of flights serving Africa, using the Red Sea route to the east or the route to the west of Africa and Morocco.

Yesterday, Niger’s ruling junta announced the closure of the country’s airspace until further notice, citing the growing threat of military intervention by the Economic Community of West African States to reinstate president Mohamed Bazoum.