Serbian national air carrier Air Serbia dismissed media reports on Thursday about high prices of tickets for flights from Russia to Belgrade as deliberate misinformation.
A press release said that “speculation and untrue claims regarding the prices of Air Serbia tickets between Belgrade and destinations in the Russian Federation were published on some Serbian media and social networks.”
Air Serbia said it did not want to comment on “the reasons why certain media and persons would like to spread misinformation about the allegedly high ticket prices.”
“Tickets for all flights in September have been sold out for a long time. When it comes to October, there are still very few tickets available in the first half of the month,” it said.
Belgrade media reported on Wednesday that tickets for flights from Moscow to Belgrade cost as much as €9,000.
According to Air Serbia’s press release, one-way economy class tickets for flights from Moscow to Belgrade start at €397.
“The most expensive available one-way ticket in economy class between Moscow and Belgrade costs €567. When it comes to return tickets from Moscow to Belgrade in economy class, the lowest available price starts at €816, and the highest possible is €1,156. All prices are shown in total, including all associated taxes,” the press release said.
Large numbers of Russians have already left the country since the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and many more are trying to leave Russia since Russian President Vladimir Putin two days ago ordered the mobilisation of up to 300,000 military reservists to fight in Ukraine.
Air Serbia is, besides Turkish Airlines, the only European air carrier to maintain flights to Russia despite an EU flight embargo. According to news agencies, after Putin’s orders, tickets for the Moscow-Belgrade flight quickly sold out for the next several days, while the price for flights from Moscow to Istanbul or Dubai reached as much as €9,200 for a one-way, economy-class fare.
Russian citizens do not need a visa to enter Serbia.
