Korea Express Air (KEA, Seoul Gimpo) notified officials in Japan's southwestern prefecture of Shimane on July 11 that it would cancel six flights between Seoul Gimpo and Izumo until July 25, to resume on July 27.
The decision stemmed from multiple reservation cancellations, the airline said, which Shimane Governor Tatsuya Maruyama said was likely due to worsening relations between the two countries, the Japanese public broadcaster NHK reported.
The 3x weekly route began on June 6 on fifty-seat E145 aircraft and is scheduled to end in October. Load factors averaged 50.3% between June 6 and July 11, according to the Japan Times, with a total of 402 people travelling during the period. Korea Express Air had been considering turning the charter flights into a scheduled service.
Tokyo and Seoul have long engaged in political spats stemming from Japan’s conduct during World War Two, but the latest dispute spilled into the trade arena in early July when Japan restricted exports of materials necessary for Korea’s high-tech industry, citing national security concerns.
Koreans are cancelling trips to Japan as part of a social media-fuelled travel boycott amid the tensions, Korea's JoongAng Daily reported on July 15, adding that the tour operator AM Tour had tentatively shut down tours to Japan on aircraft chartered from Korea Express Air.
“Until last week, more than forty people had booked the tour, but after the start of the Stop Travelling to Japan movement, bookings halved,” a spokesperson from the operator said. “We concluded that it’s not effective to maintain the tour programme on chartered planes.”
Korea Express Air continues to operate its 3x weekly scheduled service from Yangyang to Kitakyushu, the northernmost city on Japan’s southern Kyushu Island, together with its two other scheduled routes, Yangyang-Jeju and Yangyang-Busan.
