Dictators of the Skies?

[usehername]

If the government of Canada is "blocking competition" for Air Canada, would that not constitute a type of 'support'? I don't know that they are blocking competition, just unfair competition.

Maybe the Canadian government would have limited the UAE slots without any input from AC, who knows.

"Open skies is an international policy concept which calls for the liberalization of rules and regulations on international aviation industry most specially commercial aviation - opening a free market for the airline industry. Its primary objectives are:
· to liberalize the rules for international aviation markets and minimizes government intervention — the provisions apply to passenger, all-cargo and combination air transportation and encompass both scheduled and charter services; or
· to adjust the regime under which military and other state-based flights may be permitted.
For open skies to effect, a bilateral (and sometimes multilateral) Air Transport Agreement has to be concluded between two or more nations."

In reference to the first bullet point, "minimize government intervention".

EK is owned by the government.

The UAE kicked the Canadian Armed Forces out of Mirage because they did not get their 60+ weekly landing slots in Canada.

This is blatant government intervention and goes against the first objective of the open skies agreement.

"Emirates is a subsidiary of The Emirates Group, which has over 50,000 employees, and is wholly owned by the government of Dubai directly under the Investment Corporation of Dubai.[7] "

Canada is not the first, nor the last, nation to block or limit foreign carriers. Nor is Canada the only nation with a concern for its own economy and interests with regards to EK.

"Some of these carriers—notably Air France and Qantas—are so concerned about the detrimental effects of Emirates' growth on their future ability to compete with it on a level playing field that they have resorted to openly accusing their Dubai-based rival of receiving hidden state subsidies and of maintaining too cozy a relationship with Dubai's airport authority as well as its aviation authority, both of which are also wholly state-owned entities that share the same government owner with the airline. In addition, they have also accused Emirates of taking unfair advantage of its government shareholders' sovereign borrower status. They claim that this masks its true financial performance and reduces its borrowing costs below market rates.[85][163]"