Pursuant to the instructions of the Head of State Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev, by the order of the Minister of Industry and Infrastructure Development of the Republic of Kazakhstan, from November 1, 2019, the “open skies” regime will be introduced at the airports of Nur-Sultan, Almaty, Shymkent, Aktau, Karaganda, Ust-Kamenogorsk, Pavlodar, Kokshetau, Taraz, Petropavlovsk, Semey, which provides for the removal of restrictions on the number of flights and the provision to foreign airlines of the fifth degree of "freedom of air" in areas that Kazakhstan carriers do not operate on.

The “open sky” regime is valid for 3 years with the possibility of further extension.

The introduction of the “open skies” regime in Kazakhstan will help attract new foreign carriers, open new international routes, increase competition and ultimately affect the reduction of airfare and the availability of air transport for the general population, as well as tourism and international transport access to the International Financial Centre "Astana".

Flights with the 5th degree of “freedom of air” are the flights of a foreign airlines through the cities of Kazakhstan to the cities of third countries, this will increase the transit potential of Kazakhstan as well as transit traffic through the domestic airports.

Since the instruction of the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan on the implementation of the “open sky” regime, the following measures have been taken:

• negotiations were held with the aviation authorities of Oman, and as a result SalamAir plans to begin flights from Muscat to Almaty next year;

• Air Astana plans to open flights to Jeddah - 3 flights a week in the I quarter of 2020, SCAT plans to start flights to Jeddah and Medina 2 times a week from November 30 this year;

• on October 22-24 this year negotiations were held with Asia's largest low-cost carrier Air Asia and global airline Singapore Airlines;

• negotiations were held with Ural Airlines on December 22 of this year a flight will be opened on the route Yekaterinburg - Almaty;

• Fly Arystan will begin daily flights from Nur-Sultan-Moscow from December 13, 2019;

• negotiations were held with LOT airline, the Polish airline will increase the number of flights to 7 flights a week from Warsaw to Nur-Sultan from the summer of 2020 and will open flights to Almaty since 2021.

In the near future, meetings will be held with the Qatar aviation authorities on flights of the Qatar Airways airlines, with the aviation authorities of the United Arab Emirates with Emirates, Fly Dubai and other countries to open new flights.