KATHMANDU: Finance Minister Dr Prakash Sharan Mahat has urged the European Union (EU) to remove Nepal from its aviation safety concern list.

He made this request in a sideline meeting with EU Commissioner Ms Jutta Urpilainen in Marrakesh, Morocco.

The Finance Minister is currently in Marrakesh in connection with participating in the annual meeting of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Similarly, during the meeting he urged the EU to increase its economic assistance to Nepal, Minister Mahat’s secretariat stated.

Since 2013 the EU has put Nepal’s airline companies in its list of air safety concerns and due to this the airline companies of Nepal are not allowed to operate flights in the European skies.

The EU had refused to de-list Nepali airlines from the list of aviation concerns when it carried out a monitoring of Nepali airlines in 2079BS.

It had announced its plan of conducting an on-site monitoring of the status of air safety issues in February 2023, but EU team did not come to Nepal for the monitoring following the air crash near the Pokhara Airport on January 15.

The EU’s security committee has however conducted an on-site study of Nepali airlines companies and on aviation security in August/September and the Finance Minister has made this request in this context.

On the occasion, the EU Commissioner said that they would be carrying out works on this matter through the EU Embassy in Nepal and also held discussions on this.