Moscow’s Domodedovo airport nationalized

:: Domodedovo

Moscow’s Domodedovo International Airport (IATA: DME), one of the largest in Russia, has been handed over to the ownership of the state. At the June 17 sitting, the Moscow Region Court of Arbitration ruled for DME Holding company, the owner of Domodedovo Airport assets, to be collected to state revenue as per the Prosecutor General’s Office litigation.

In the litigation, filed early this year, the Prosecutor General called for 100 per cent shares of DME Holding to be collected to state revenue, and declare null all changes of jurisdiction within Domodedovo perimeter. According to the law suit, the airport’s beneficiaries Dmitry Kamenschik and Valery Kogan, both said to be residents of other states, managed the assets of Russia’s strategic enterprise and transferred its revenues abroad, breaching the legislation of Russian Federation.

Domodedovo became private in 1998 and remained the last wholly privately owned airport in Moscow. Other two capital airports – Sheremetyevo and Vnukovo – both have state shares. In 2005 the state made an attempt to regain control of the airport. In 2016 Dmitriy Kamenschik was arrested due to a terrorist act, which had occurred at Domodedovo five years earlier. The charges pressed against him coincided in time with change of ownership of Vnukovo and Sheremetyevo and the government’s plans to integrate all three of Moscow’s airports into one cluster under single owner.

Since Domodedovo became private, its owners undertook a total remake of the airport’s passenger terminal, radically increasing its capacity.

Between 2004 and 2015 it was Russia’s largest airport, after which it ceded its leadership to Sheremetyevo.

The peak traffic was recorded in 2017, when Domodedovo handled 30.6 million passengers.

But by 2024 the traffic was just half of that – 15.6 million. According to Russia’s aviation authority Rosaviatsia, in January through April the traffic further decreased by nine per cent year-on-year to 4.2 million passengers.

Up until March 2022, DME has been preferred airport for flights to Moscow by members of the two airline alliances – Star Alliance and oneworld.