MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Russian airlines carried over 88 million passengers in 2016, despite closure of several international routes, Russian Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov said Wednesday.
"We can say that on average, [the volume] of air transportation by Russian airlines has not fallen very much, despite the fact that international destinations such as Egypt, Turkey, Ukraine were closed, and showed the results at the level of the past year, 88 million [passengers], even a little more passengers were served by Russian companies," Sokolov said at the meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
According to Russia's air transport agency Rosaviatsia, passenger traffic in 2015 decreased by 1.2 percent and amounted to 92 million people. Judging by 11 months of 2016, Russian airlines carried 81.9 million people, which is 5.4 percent less than the same period last year.
