Air Kazakhstan (1996) (Almaty International) is to be resurrected as the country's new domestic carrier Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev announced following talks with Pierre Beaudoin, the President and Chief Executive Officer of Bombardier Aerospace (BBA, Montréal Trudeau).

“We are interested in cooperation with such a world famous company as Bombardier. In this regard, we are planning to establish once more the “Air Kazakhstan” company that will perform domestic flights. As you know, we established Air Astana (KC, Astana Nursultan Nazarbayev) in partnership with BAe Systems,” Nazarbayev said adding that experience gained from Air Astana would be used in establishing Air Kazakhstan. "Apart from the cooperation in the field of aircraft, we are interested in projects in other sectors of the transport industry,” he ended.

Using a fleet of Dash 8-400s, the airline will serve local airfields currently too small for Air Astana's all-jet fleet. Once operational Air Kazakhstan will allow Air Astana to focus on serving the regional and international market.

The joint venture with the Canadian aircraft and train manufacturer will also allow for the training of both local pilots as well as specialists in the MRO field.

The original Air Kazakhstan served as the country's national carrier until 2004 when it collapsed under a mountain of debt. The state-backed airline was succeeded by Air Astana, a joint venture between Kazakhstan's sovereign wealth fund Samruk-Kazyna (51%), and BAE Systems PLC (49%).

Commenting on the re-launch of Air Kazakhstan, Peter Foster, President of Air Astana, said: “Air Astana has been involved in the discussions of the formation of a regional airline with our majority shareholder, Samruk-Kazyna, since we retired the Fokker 50 fleet last January. There are many domestic airports we cannot serve with our all jet fleet, and it was therefore imperative that steps be taken to serve these cities with modern turboprops operating to internationally compliant standards. Bombardier’s Q400 clearly meets this criterion."

Foster said both airlines would collaborate in jointly developing the local market to each other's mutual benefit.