Uzbekistan and Serbia have held discussions over improving economic cooperation, including the introduction of flights. Officials from Uzbekistan held talks with Air Serbia’s CEO, Jiri Marek, as well as the Serbian Minister for Finance, Siniša Mali, and the Serbian Minister for Construction, Transport and Infrastructure, Aleksandra Sofronijecić last week. This was followed by the Serbia – Uzbekistan business forum in Tashkent last Friday, marking the third high-level economic discussion between the two countries since the start of the year. The Deputy Prime Minister of Uzbekistan, leading a large business delegation, is expected to visit Serbia shortly.
Air Serbia recently said there is interest from carriers in Central Asia to launch flights to Belgrade. “You can now see airlines in Central Asia beginning to view Belgrade differently and recognising its potential. For us, any carrier from that region that wants to fly to Belgrade will have our support and full access to our network. These are routes where capacity is already fully utilised on a single daily rotation due to long block times. We have many other markets we would like to open but lack the capacity, so we would prefer someone else to operate them. These markets are predominantly connecting rather than strong point-to-point”, Air Serbia’s CEO, Jiri Marek, said.
Uzbekistan’s Air Samarkand has expressed interest in launching services to Belgrade, with airline officials holding talks in Serbia on the matter last December. Belgrade was last linked to Uzbekistan by a scheduled air service in 2004, when Uzbekistan Airways operated flights between Tashkent, Belgrade and New York using Boeing 767 aircraft. In late October last year, Serbian officials said Air Serbia was conducting feasibility studies into launching services, in partnership with another carrier, to either Tashkent or Samarkand. Belgrade Airport’s incentive scheme, introduced in 2024, also targets routes from the Central Asia region.
