Pegasus Airlines (PC, Istanbul Sabiha Gökcen) and Onur Air (Istanbul Airport) have suspended flights to Russia until January 13 and 14 respectively after failing to secure visas for the flights crews. According to the ch-aviation route database, Pegasus Airlines serves Krasnodar, Makhachkala, Mineralnye Vody, and Moscow Domodedovo from Istanbul Sabiha Gökcen while Onur Air serves Kazan and Moscow Sheremetyevo from Antalya, and Nalchik from Istanbul Atatürk.
The Anatolia news agency reports that Turkish Airlines (TK, Istanbul Airport) had earlier obtained visas for its staff leaving their flights to Russia unaffected. Other Turkish carriers to serve Russia include AtlasGlobal (Istanbul Airport) and MNG Airlines (MB, Istanbul Airport) (cargo only) though the status of their operations is currently unknown.
Turkey's Minister of Transport, Communications and Maritime Affairs, Binali Yıldırım, has said Ankara would not take any counter measures against the Russians but would instead 'diplomatically' remind Moscow of its obligations to adhere to ICAO norms.
Russia imposed economic and trade sanctions against Turkey in November last year in retaliation for the latter's downing of a Russian fighter jet near the Turkey/Syria border. At the time, Russian president Vladimir Putin directed his government to ban charter flights to/from Turkey while advising Russian travel agencies to cease selling tours to Turkey.
