Great Wall Airlines to fly again

Great Wall Airlines to fly again Shanghai-based Great Wall Airlines plans to resume operations in February after the U.S. Treasury Department removed it from its list of designated companies, allowing the all-cargo startup airline to resume operations after almost four months inactivity.
   In August, the Treasury Department imposed sanctions on one of Great Wall's parents, China Great Wall Industry Corp. and all of its subsidiaries, accusing it of supplying Iran with weapons of mass destruction. The decision prohibited American companies from providing technical support to the Great Wall, forcing the airline to shut down.
   Great Wall started operations in June with a six-times-weekly freighter service between Shanghai and Amsterdam. Later additions to its network included Seoul Incheon Airport in South Korea to the existing service as well as a three-times weekly service between Shanghai and Mumbai and Chennai in India.
   The airline said it hopes to start operations once it leases in February two Boeing 747-400 Freighters from another of its parents, Singapore Airlines Cargo.
   'We expect to resume services soon,' said Tan Kai Ping, president of Great Wall. 'During this period where we've been unable to operate, we have maintained contact with our customers, many of whom have been very supportive of us as we appealed the decision of the U.S. Treasury Department.
   'We'd particularly like to thank those customers, and our staff who stuck by us. We commit to them that we will return to operations with vigor and enthusiasm,' Tan said. “We would also like to thank the U.S. Treasury for the opportunity to have our appeal heard. At no time was it ever suggested that Great Wall Airlines had played a role in any activity for which sanctions were imposed.'
   Great Wall is owned by the Beijing Aerospace Satellite Applications Corp. (51 percent), part of China Great Wall Industry Corp.; Singapore Airlines Cargo (25 percent); and Dahlia Investments (24 percent), a wholly owned subsidiary of Singapore-state owned Temasek Holdings.