► ALGERIA: Tassili Airlines to start domestic ops next year?

Algeria's Tassili Airlines (SF), until now a charter company operating flights mainly for oil companies, will "at some point in the first half of 2013", launch scheduled domestic Algerian operations, which until now, has remained the preserve of Air Algèrie.

Tassili Pilatus 6 on desert ops (MHerzig)

According to French paper, Air Journal,  Tassili has been explicit in stating that it would seek to "cooperate" rather than compete with Algerian national carrier Air Algèrie (AT) who have enjoyed a de facto monopoly on domestic traffic.

Tassili Airlines was granted a licence to operate domestic flights by the Algerian government in September 2011, with its first flights expected to have been in the air in April of this year. Primary focus will, in all likelihood, be on developing routes in the north of the country, before gradually expanding its network to the more sparse and arid south.

Founded in 1997, Tassili Airlines is a 100-percent-owned subsidiary of the Algerian parastatal Sonatrach Petroleum Corporation, and uses its fleet of four Boeing 737-800s to transport employees and cargo between large Algerian cities and Sonatrach work sites. 

It became an associate member of the Arab Air Carriers Organization at the recently ended 45th AACO AGM  held in Algiers.