Starting April 13, 2012, Belavia Airlines will no longer be operating flights to Yekaterinburg. This ban (involving a number of other Russian cities as well) was imposed by Rosaviation, Kommersant reports.

The ultimatum delivered by Byelorussia to Russian air carriers resulted in yet another conflict escalation in the field of air travel. In response to Byelorussia threatening to limit the number of flights Russian airlines can operate from Moscow to Minsk, Russia’s Transport Ministry informed Byelorussia that, starting April 13, Belavia will also be unable to operate flights from Minsk to Russian cities. The two parties will try to prevent a new air travel ban on Monday.

The newspaper’s source who is in the know of how the talks are progressing between Russia and Byelorussia said the country’s Transport & Communications Ministry received a letter from Russia’s Deputy Transport Minister Valery Okulov. The letter says that Moscow imposes limitations on Belavia’s Yekaterinburg-, Saint Petersburg-, Sochi-, Kaliningrad-, and Novosibirsk-bound flights on April 13. This means the Russian air travel authorities only agreed to let Belavia operate Minsk-Moscow flights.