Although the spread of coronavirus has reached pandemic levels globally, Hungary's Wizz Air budget airline launched its first flight to Yerevan today.

We are talking about the Vienna-Yerevan-Vienna flight. The plane has since landed in Yerevan and has departed for Vienna.

Last December it was announced that European low-cost airlines were planning to launch air travel between Yerevan and Vienna as well as between Vilnius beginning in April this year. Later, it became known that there would be Larnaca-Yerevan-Larnaca flights as of June. Two flights weekly were planned in all directions/.

It is noteworthy that for many years Vienna-Yerevan-Vienna flights were operated by Austrian Airlines, a company that has suspended all scheduled flights from March 18, including to Armenia. On the other hand, on March 17 Armenian Deputy Prime Minister Tigran Avinyan (appointed Head of Armenia’s State of Emergency Commission) decided to ban the entry of citizens to Armenia from sixteen countries, including Austria, to Armenia.

This means that via Wizz Air, citizens of countries not included in the list of the sixteen countries can travel to Armenia from Vienna.

The sixteen countries are China, Iran, South Korea, Japan, Italy, Spain, France, Germany, Switzerland, Denmark, Austria, Belgium, Norway, Sweden, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. To this list we must add Russia and Georgia, countries for which the Armenian government has instituted travel restrictions.

 It should also be noted that all RA citizens arriving from Vienna to Yerevan, according to a decision taken by Avinyan, must be undergo a 14-day quarantine or self-isolation regime.

Last year, Armenia’s National Assembly decided to exempt individuals departing on the newly opened routes from the 10,000 AMD "air duty".

 In this case, new flights are considered destinations that have not been served in the last 12 months. Since Vienna-Yerevan-Vienna flights have been operated by Austrian Airlines until recently, travelers on Wizz Air will not be exempt from the above-mentioned duty.

Update (22:57) – Armenia’s Civil Aviation Committee reports that 14 Armenian citizens arrived in Vienna from Yerevan on the first flight of Wizz Air and that eight Austrian citizens left Armenia on the return trip.