Brussels, 21/09/2004 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission initialled a cross-cutting aviation agreement with Chile at the beginning of September. Once signed and entered into force, the agreement will allow all European airlines access to the Chilean market from any Member State. This agreement will not replace the bilateral agreements in place between the Member States of the EU and Chile, but will bring them into line with Community law by ending the discriminatory provisions which only allowed European airlines to fly to Chile from their country of origin, state European sources.
The agreement concluded with Chile, the first of its kind, and more limited than the one the Commission is trying to conclude with the United States and aims, in the long term, for total liberalisation of the air travel market on either side of the Atlantic. The Commission has not, however, ruled out the possibility of a more ambitious agreement with Chile in a few years' time, according to the same sources.
In the meantime, the Commission has started negotiations with several countries to conclude the same kind of horizontal agreement: Croatia, Georgia, Morocco, Lebanon, Jordan, Australia, New Zealand and Singapore.