Australia negotiates "open skies" agreement with the United States

The new Australian Minister for Infrastructure, Hon Anthony Albanese, announced on 15 February 2008 that Australia has negotiated an "open skies" agreement with the United States of America. The negotiations, which were held in Washington DC from 12 to 14 February 2008, on the Australian side were led by officials from the recently renamed Department of Infrastructure. The US Department for Transportation released a short statement on 14 February 2008 while the US State Department released a Media Note the same day as the Australians.

A notable feature is the agreement to relax the "Fly America" policy after October 2008. Also included is an exchange of seventh freedom cargo rights. It will be interesting to see to what extent the text of the new agreement differs from the new "model" text the US State Department has had since 10 January 2008.

A major beneficiary of the new agreement is expected to be Virgin Blue subsidiary, V Australia. The Minister is reported by the Sydney Morning Herald as specifically noting that the new Labor Government was not intending to grant fifth freedom access to either Singapore or Canada.

New Zealand first negotiated a bilateral "open skies" agreement with the United States back in 1997.

Singapore concludes "open skies" agreements with Denmark, Norway and Sweden

On 29 January 2008 Singapore announced that it had concluded "open skies" air services agreements with Denmark, Norway and Sweden. The three new agreements include an exchange of seventh freedom cargo rights.

Because of the unusual ownership of Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS Group), these three countries negotiate air services arrangements as a bloc.

This brings the total number of "open skies" relationships Singapore has to 20, 13 of which are with European Union countries.

Hong Kong-Japan air services arrangements reformed

A 1 February 2008 press release from the Hong Kong Government announced the removal of capacity and frequency limits for all air services by the airlines of the two parties between Hong Kong and Japan (except Tokyo).