Iran says officials from Airbus will arrive in Tehran on Sunday to discuss sales of planes to the country in what may be the first direct contact between the two sides after the removal of sanctions against the Islamic Republic.      

The announcement over Airbus plane sales talks was made by Ahmad-Reza Bayati, the secretary of CAPA Iran Aviation Summit 2016 which will open on Sunday with the participation of over 160 companies from 35 countries.

Bayati said officials from Boeing were also to visit Iran for similar talks, but their trip was cancelled due to visa issues.

“Iran may not be able to be successful over purchases of planes over the next few years,” the official has been quoted as saying by Tasnim news agency. “Therefore, our first priority will be to lease planes.”

Apart from Airbus, the participants will include Canada’s aerospace and transportation company Bombardier and Brazil’s aerospace company Embraer.

The summit is being organized by CAPA – the Centre for Aviation – which is a specialist aviation industry intelligence and research practice headquartered in Sydney. This summit is meant to bring together all of the key decision-makers from Iran with leading figures from the global community to help shape the direction of Iran’s aviation industry in a post-sanctions environment.

Iranian officials have already said that the country’s civil aviation fleet consists of 248 aircraft with an average age of 20 years, 100 of which are presently grounded.

Minister of Roads and Urban Development Abbas Akhundi has said that Iran would need to buy at least 500 commercial aircraft of various models at a cost of $50 billion.

The sanctions on Iran for purchases of new planes became ineffective last week upon the implementation of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) that Iran agreed on with the P5+1 in July 2015.

Before the implementation of the JCPOA, Akhundi had said that Iran plans to purchase 114 civil aircraft from Airbus.

"We have taken the first step in agreeing with Airbus to buy 114 planes," he was quoted as saying by the media.

A deal for 114 airplanes would be worth more than $10 billion at catalogue prices, depending on the type of aircraft, Reuters reported.




 By Press TV