KUWAIT: A crisis may be brewing between the Philippine Airlines and Kuwait Airways before the Manila-based carrier is set to resume flights to the emirate. According to a Philippine news outlet, the Philippine Airlines has asked the Philippine government to revoke the fifth freedom rights of Kuwait Airways under a bilateral air treaty agreement because the Kuwait government has refused to grant the same privileges to the Philippine Airlines.

Fifth freedom rights allow a carrier to pick up passengers from a foreign country during a multi-leg journey flight. Kuwait Airways has the right, extended by Manila, to pick up passengers in Bangkok on its Kuwait-Bangkok-Manila flight (and the return route as well).

Philippines Airlines has asked for the fifth freedom right to pick up passengers on its Manila-Dubai-Kuwait flight, scheduled to begin service on January 17.

"Similarly, invoking 5th freedom rights, the flag carrier should be allowed to pick up passengers in Dubai to be flown to Kuwait and vice versa," a spokesperson for Philippine Airlines told The Standard. But Kuwait's Directorate General of Civil Aviation reportedly rejected the Philippine Airline's request on January 5, essentially barring the Philippines carrier from picking up passengers on its route to Kuwait in Dubai - both coming and returning back to the Philippines.