Syrian Airline “Cham Wings” is back on the EU sanctions list as of 22 January 2024 after an ARIJ investigation, after it was removed from the list In July 2022, without providing evidence that the original cause for sanction had ceased to exist.
Country:
Libya, Syria
Date:
2024
Syrian airline “Cham Wings” is back on the EU sanctions list as of 22 January 2024 after an ARIJ investigation, after it was removed from the list In July 2022, without providing evidence that the original cause for sanction had ceased to exist.
ARIJ’s investigation “A bloody route through Libya: Europe-Bound Migrants Caught Between Cham Wings Airlines And Haftar’s Army”, uncovered how human trafficking networks and travel agencies exploit Syrians wanting to migrate to Europe, by taking them to Libya on flights operated by the private Syrian Airline company, Al Cham Wings, in cooperation with the Military Investment Authority of the Libyan National Army, under the command of Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar.
Since 2016, this private Syrian carrier has been involved in many controversies. On 23 December 2016, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated the airline on its sanctions list for its involvement in the transport of Russian and Iranian troops to fight in Syria.
On 18 March 2020, the Ministry of Interior of the Government of National Accord, based in Tripoli in Western Libya, accused Cham Wings of bringing Syrian fighters with connections to the Russian military Wagner Group into Eastern Libya.
In fall 2021, Cham Wings was also involved in the transport of migrants from Damascus to the Belarusian capital, Minsk, going as far as opening two new offices there. Tens of thousands of migrants arrived in Belarus, some of them on Cham Wings flights, to try to enter irregularly into the EU. Therefore, the European Council sanctioned the airline in November 2021.
However, observers were baffled when, in July 2022, the airline was removed from the EU sanctions list without providing evidence that the original cause for sanction had ceased to exist, only to be back on the list earlier this year following the publication of the investigation.
