MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Falklands Sao Paulo air link to become operational next October to coincide with tourist season

The second commercial air link should become operational next October

Argentina and the UK have agreed that the second commercial air link between the Falkland Islands and South America, with a stopover at Cordoba, Argentina, will begin operational next October in coincidence with the South Atlantic summer tourist season, according to Martin Dinatale, an Argentine journalist who specializes in diplomatic affairs.

The agreement was reached in Ottawa, on the sidelines of the Lima Group foreign ministers meeting, a regional group created to address the Venezuelan situation and which this Monday held a round of talks in Canada. The participants were Sir Alan Duncan, Foreign Office minister for Latin American affairs and Argentine foreign minister Jorge Faurie.

Allegedly the two officials agreed that the Latam Brazil weekly flight between MPA and Sao Paulo, with two monthly calls in Cordoba, should begin operations in October, “taking advantage the tourist summer season and to continue advancing in other bilateral accords”.

The second commercial flight between the Falklands and the continent was part of the 2016 UK/Argentina joint communiqué which also included the successful humanitarian task of identifying Argentine soldiers remains buried in the Islands, and the recent resumption, after fourteen years, of joint fisheries scientific research cruises in the South Atlantic to check on the biomnass of squid and fin fish species.

A second commercial airlink has been a long standing demand from the Falklands's main industries as the economy of the Islands develops. The schme is basically similar to that existent for the Punta Arenas/MPA Latam weekly flight with two monthly calls at Rio Gallegos.

Finally, according to Dinatale, Faurie and Duncan also talked about increasing bilateral trade, in a post Brexit scenario and even possibly, joint investments and exploration in the South Atlantic oil industry.