The Bazar case of an international airport that should be, and tried to be, but failed to be

Across the world many airports aspire to be international when they not and some not be international when they are.

The Bangladeshi government has coveted international status for Cox's Bazar airport on the Bay of Bengal for 13 years. The city-region has the longest sandy beach on Earth by a country mile and a domestic tourism base to go with it.

But there are few international visitors, which the government craves. The fact you can't fly there internationally and have to travel usually via Dhaka Airport doesn't help.

So since 2018 and especially so in 2025 the government and airport authority have worked to bring that status and early in Oct-2025 the airport was declared 'international'.

The trouble is that no airline seems to want to fly there internationally. Even flag carrier Biman Bangladesh which wanted to fly from Cox's Bazar to Kolkata in India has withdrawn its interest since the government did a complete volte face and de-internationalised the airport less than a fortnight later.

Something has gone seriously wrong here and it seems the necessary groundwork wasn't even started, never mind completed.

There is still hope. This is a vacation destination ripe for exploitation; it just needs a professional approach.

This report examines the reasons for this turn of events and suggests some possible remedies, including the assistance of a certain secret agent that covets assignments in attractive beach destinations.