UAE company connected to Iran Air triple Boeing 747 deal

According to the UK’s flightglobal online news service, Iran Air has acquired the first of three Boeing 747-300s from Al Sayegh Airlines, the Kyrghyzstan operator owned by

The 1986-vintage aircraft which is still in storage, has been registered in Gambia since last month according to flightglobal.

UAE-based Sayegh Group, founded by Saleem Al Sayegh, the chief executive of UAE-based National Paints, owns Kyrgyzstan-based Al Sayegh Airlines which was created with the aim of operating five cargo aircraft and three passenger aircraft, according to reports at the time.

Flightglobal quotes the company as saying: "Please note that Sayegh Group sold the three 747-300s to an aviation company, but not to Iran."

The aircraft are believe to have been sold to an unnamed Gambian company. "It looks like the Gambian entity has fronted the deal," a source told flightglobal which said Al Sayegh Airlines has two further 747-300s in its fleet that are also both in storage and scheduled to be sold to Iran Air in May this year. Both aircraft are currently registered in Burkina Faso as XT-DMA and XT-SAG, respectively, having been operated until late 2010 by Centrafrique Air Express.

According to Flightglobal, the three 747-300s were formerly operated by Qantas, and were only delivered to Al Sayegh Airlines in 2010. According to US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) documents, the aircraft were acquired by Sayegh Group Aviation, also under the National Paints umbrella.