Skip to content Skip to Search
Skip navigation

Russian flight prices to Dubai soar as Putin orders army call-up

Airport, Airfield, Airplane Emirates
Air travel from Russia to the UAE this year exceeded pre-pandemic levels by 27%

One-way ticket prices to Dubai from Russia have skyrocketed after President Vladimir Putin ordered the immediate call-up of 300,000 reservists.

Flights to Dubai cost more than 300,000 roubles ($5,000), nearly five times the average monthly wage, Reuters reported.

Direct flights from Moscow to Istanbul, Turkey and Yerevan, Armenia, which allow visa-free entry, were sold out on Wednesday, according to Aviasales data.

One-way fares to Turkey shot up to almost 70,000 roubles ($1,150), compared with a little over 22,000 roubles a week ago, Google Flights data shows.

Some routes with stopovers, including those from Moscow to Tbilisi, Georgia, were unavailable.

Air travel from Russia to the UAE during the first eight months of the year exceeded pre-pandemic levels by 27 percent, AGBI reported, citing London-based global travel data and analytics firm ForwardKeys.

Olivier Ponti, vice president of insights at ForwardKeys, said that flight bookings for the next four months, covering September to December 2022, are 112 percent ahead (as of August 17) compared to the same period in 2019.

According to Dubai’s Department of Economy and Tourism, Western Europe accounted for 22 percent of tourist arrivals, while Russia, CIS, and Eastern Europe together accounted for 11 percent of total visitors.

Putin’s announcement, made in an early-morning television address, raised fears that some men of fighting age would not be allowed to leave the country.

Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said the call-up would be limited to those with experience as professional soldiers, and that students and conscripts would not be called up.

Latest articles

Egypt’s population growth rate hits 50-year low

Egypt, the most populous Arab nation in the world, has seen its population growth rate decline by 1.4 percent in 2023, reaching its lowest level in half a century. The country’s population growth rate fell by 46 percent from 2017 to 2023, Ahram Online, an English media outlet, reported, quoting planning and economic development minister […]

Emirati director Nayla Al Khaja. Her film 'Three' is currently being shown in UAE theatres in Mandarin using Camb.ai's AI translation programme

Dubai startup helps AI-voice cloning take centre stage

A YouTube video released in January of Novak Djokovic shows the tennis star speaking fluent Spanish at a post-match press conference.  While the Serbian champion is renowned for speaking several languages, in this case his voice was created by an artificial intelligence tool developed by a Dubai-based startup, Camb.ai. The original Djokovic footage was taken […]

Acwa Power to build $800m desalination plant in Senegal

Acwa Power, Saudi Arabia’s operator of power generation and desalinated water production plants, will construct a SAR3 billion ($800 million) desalination plant in Dakar, Senegal. The company signed an agreement with Senegal’s ministry of water and sanitation and state-backed National Water Company, to build a 400,000 cubic metres per day desalination plant in Dakar. The […]

Alec IPO SeaWorld Abu Dhabi

Alec IPO could start listings rush in construction sector

A listing by Dubai’s Alec Engineering and Contracting could open the gates for more construction-related companies to go public as they take advantage of the country’s buoyant property market, according to a business expert. Alec, which is backed by the Investment Corporation of Dubai (ICD), the emirate’s sovereign wealth fund, is behind some of the […]