This is correct, as described in my post #11 above. The income for Aeroflot last year from them was about USD 200m, which was significantly more than Aeroflot's overall profit for the year. Cancelling the fees, or not, has become embroiled with the EU's threat to start charging airlines silly "pollution fees" based on how much fuel they use - if the EU starts actually levying these then you can wave goodbye to the Russian overflight fees being ended.

Any U.S. citizen with relatives in Cuba is exempt from the embargo, so there are plenty of commercial (charter) flights from the U.S. to Cuba. I doubt anybody in Miami Center cares!

Many years ago, I remember flying to South Africa on SAA when it was not allowed to fly over much of the rest of Africa. All the European departures (except for one - more on that later) flew up the West of Africa and had to refuel at Islho de Sal (sp?) because they didn't have the range. It was extraordinary sitting on the plane there at about 2am, watching dozens of 747s coming and going, all on a refuelling stop.

The one exception was a white painted SAA 747, which they seemed happy to fly over Africa - perhaps it was leased from another nation's carrier and had those identifiers, I don't know, but I felt glad I wasn't on that plane. I told myself that, next time, I'd go on a European carrier which could overfly Africa without problem.