Georgian Gov’t dismisses reports on entry of sanctioned cargo plane as “fake”

The Georgian Economy Ministry on Thursday dismissed reports by several opposition-minded TV channels that a cargo plane under sanctions for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had entered the Georgian airspace last week. 

In details over the development, the state body said an Iran Air Cargo aircraft had made a flight from Yerevan to Moscow on Sunday, spending 10 minutes in Georgian airspace.

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The Ministry stressed the aircraft had not been under sanctions and “regularly performs flights both in the direction of Tbilisi and other European cities”. 

Instead of spreading misinformation and damaging the reputation of the civil authorities of Georgia, the media outlets - which are mostly focused on release of trending, unspecified and purposefully false reports - could have verified the information and would have found out that the Iranian cargo company regularly performs flights to Europe”, it said. 

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The Ministry also noted both Georgia and Armenia were members of Eurocontrol, the European Air Navigation Safety Organisation issuing permits for the specific flight under question as well as other operations involving use of the airspaces of the two countries. 

“Thus, the flight was performed in full compliance with Georgian and international regulations”, the body concluded.