ASTANA, Kazakhstan, March 7. Kazakhstan and the EU have discussed the issue of initialing the "Agreement between the government of the Republic of Kazakhstan and the European Union on certain aspects of air transport" (horizontal agreement), TurkicWorld reports.

The discussions took place during a meeting between the Chairman of the Civil Aviation Committee of the Ministry of Transport of Kazakhstan, Tompiyeva Saltanat, and the EU Ambassador, Kestutis Jankauskas.

During the meeting, the parties discussed the progress being made in preparation for the agreement's initialing.

Tompiyeva Saltanat stated that the initialing and subsequent signing of the horizontal agreement is a key goal in the Committee's work, as it will boost economic, business, and cultural cooperation between Kazakhstan and EU nations.

Following the discussion, the parties agreed to continue working on initialing the horizontal agreement.

The "horizontal agreement" ensures that all air carriers in the 27 EU member states have equal possibilities to operate air transport services on agreed-upon routes.

In the meantime, Kazakhstan has established international flights with 28 countries by the end of 2023. Flights are operated on 108 routes with a frequency of 550 flights per week by 4 Kazakh and 30 foreign air carriers.

In 2023, flights were opened and resumed on 23 routes to 13 countries: Lahore, Muscat, Manama, Delhi, Sharm El Sheikh, Beijing, Xi'an, Urumqi, Samarkand, Baku, Tbilisi, Kutaisi, Bishkek, Ankara, Hangzhou, and Jeddah.

In addition, the largest low-cost airline in Southeast Asia, AirAsia, announced the launch of direct flights between Almaty and Kuala Lumpur in March 2024.