A new private airline in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) plans to take advantage of the strong ethnic traffic to and from Pakistan by launching flights between Ras Al Khaimah International Airport and the cities of Karachi and Lahore. According to media reports in the Gulf region, the privately-owned venture, MMA Airline, is backed by a 26-year-old Pakistani businessman from Abbottabad, Malek Naureed Awan and has been formally registered as a business within the Ras Al Khaimah Free Zone.

There is not a lot of information about the start-up although Awan has told reports in the UAE that the airline received its Air Operator’s Certificate (AOC) on March 14, 2012 and plans to begin flights as early as May, with ambitious plans to expand into India if it can secure traffic rights. "We have already acquired two Airbus A320s to start flights. Two Boeing 777-300s are expected to join the fleet when we plan to add more destinations, such as Mumbai after traffic rights are granted," Awan is reported as saying, claiming that his own company MMA Group has made around Dh183 million ($50 million) available in launch funding.

The UAE market is currently dominated by state-owned ventures backed by the governments of Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah and Ras Al Khaimah and MMA Airline could be one of the first private commercial airline ventures to offer scheduled flights from the country.

The market between UAE and Pakistan is significant, with an estimated 2.3 million O&D passengers travelling between the two countries in 2011, up 11.2 per cent on the previous year. The market is dominated by Pakistani carriers with Pakistan International Airlines holding a 32.4 per cent share of the traffic, followed by Air Blue with a 24.1 per cent share. Emirates Airline is the largest UAE-based operator between the two countries with an 18.3 per cent share of the traffic last year.

There are currently more than 240 weekly flights between Pakistan and UAE with flights on 23 different routes offering links between eleven destinations in Pakistan and five in UAE. All together these flights provide more than 46,000 seats between the two countries in each direction every week. RAK Airways is the only direct competitor on MMA Airline’s planned routes offering a twice weekly connection between Ras Al Khaimah and Lahore.

Meanwhile, it has emerged that RAK Airways and fellow UK carrier flydubai have been given the right to operate scheduled services on routes between the UAE and various destinations in Europe, including, for the first time, the UK, thanks to a revision of the two countries bilateral air service agreements.

Under a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed in London in February, the UAE's General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) and the UK Department of Transport, granted additional rights for the two regional carriers to operate between the UK and UAE, and fifth freedom rights to operate to intermediate points beyond the UAE in Europe, including Frankfurt, Zurich, Rome, Amsterdam and Geneva.

The carriers will also be given the right to operate from the UK to intermediate points including Munich, Cologne, Paris, Zurich, Vienna and Athens.

The revised Air Service Agreement also reaffirmed the same rights for Emirates, Etihad and Air Arabia, Virgin Atlantic, British Airways, bmi and DHL and has enabled the designations for the now defunct carriers Silverjet and UK International Airlines to be removed. The revised agreement was announced in February but it was not made clear at the time which carriers had been designated operating rights.

A MoU for a new Air Services Agreement (ASA) was also signed between UAE and Greece earlier this month. Under the terms of the tentative arrangement any number of designated airlines of either country will have the right to perform scheduled air services. The UAE delegation designated Emirates Airline, Etihad Airways, Air Arabia, RAK Airways and flydubai as UAE national airlines under the memorandum, while The Hellenic Republic designated Olympic Air as Greek national carrier. The memorandum allows full flexibility on the routes, capacity, number of frequencies and types of aircraft, in any type of service (passenger or cargo) and also includes the exercise of fifth freedom traffic rights.