A government bill to reform the Department of Civil Aviation in order to reduce flight delays in Nicosia FIR (Flight Information Region) will soon be submitted to Parliament, Transport Minister Marios Demetriades told political parties on Wednesday.

Demetriades and Director Network Manager of Eurocontrol Joe Sultana held separate meetings with the leader of the ruling party DISY, the Secretary General of the left-wing party AKEL, the president of the socialist party EDEK and the president of the Cyprus Green Party.

“Soon we will be ready to table the bill to the House of Representatives”, the Minister said in statements after the meetings, adding that “a more flexible structure will be established to achieve much better results”.

Demetriades said that the average flight delay in Nicosia airspace exceeds two minutes, while the target set by Eurocontrol is 0,3 minutes.

“We are well above the set target and it certainly creates various problems, even political concerns” he noted.

The bill, he said, aims at establishing a state owned company governed by private law rules that will operate more effectively in order to reduce delay time in Nicosia FIR and improve the provision of services. “It is a model that has been applied in many countries with great success and we believe that it will be successful in our case too” he said.