Russia wants the United States to allow it to buy Boeing planes with frozen state funds if a ceasefire is reached in Ukraine, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday, citing a source in Moscow.
Russia is aware that the frozen assets cannot be used to buy aircraft without a ceasefire in Ukraine, but the transaction is not a condition for agreeing to a ceasefire, we read. In the event of an end to hostilities, agreement to sell the aircraft could be part of the weakening of the sanctions regime by the United States.
Asked for comment, National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes said the U.S. would not discuss any economic commitments until a ceasefire was in place.
Russia wants relief for Aeroflot
Russia has previously demanded that the US lift sanctions on its flagship airline Aeroflot. Moscow also wants to restore direct flights between the US and Russia. The US has not yet publicly responded to that proposal.
Boeing has ended its operations in Russia ahead of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
The sale of aircraft to Russia is being discussed against the backdrop of a tariff war. On Tuesday, Bloomberg reported that in response to US tariffs on Chinese goods, Beijing ordered airlines to suspend the delivery of more Boeing aircraft.
As the Moscow Times newspaper portal emphasized, since the beginning of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Russian civil aviation has been struggling with the effects of severe sanctions. The restrictions include the supply of spare parts and finished aircraft to Russia. Boeing and Airbus do not provide technical support for aircraft used by Russian airlines.
Airplanes repaired with “wire”
Russian carriers are therefore forced to repair Western aircraft on their own. To do this, they dismantle some aircraft for parts to use in other aircraft. Two-thirds of the Russian fleet consists of foreign aircraft, which handle 90 percent of the country's passenger traffic.
The growing number of aviation incidents is evidence of the problems in the industry. In 2025, at least 10 Russian planes had to make emergency landings due to various faults. In 11 months of 2024, 208 different aviation incidents were recorded in the country, 25 percent more than in 2023. Experts believe that the number of failures will increase. (PAP)
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