The Listín Diario cites excerpts from official documents whereby the D.R. has reached agreements with El Salvador, Guatemala and Costa Rica for an open skies aviation treaty. The El Salvador airline, TACA, aspires to travel to the D.R. from Central America and also to pick up passengers here traveling to the United States. This has met with opposition of local airline and tourism sectors. Negotiations have been going on since 7 January and will continue through this week with Central American countries. Reportedly, the chief of the Dominican delegation, Vitelio Mejía Ortiz, and Hector Dada Sánchez of El Salvador, reached a consensus on articles 1-19 of the open skies agreement, only leaving for future discussion the determination of which routes would be authorized. The Association of Hotels, the Association of Dominican Pilots, the state airline (Dominicana de Aviación), and start-up private Dominican airlines have openly opposed the agreement on grounds that the nation should wait until national airlines are again authorized by the U.S. Federal Aviation Agency to fly to the States. The spirit of the agreement is that it would make it attractive for new airlines to travel to the Dominican Republic, bringing competition to Dominican skies. At present American Airlines dominates Dominican air routes.
