Emirates (EK, Dubai International) has announced that owing to a recent decline in demand for travel to the United States, it will be reducing frequencies to five of the twelve US cities it currently serves.

The Dubai-based carrier said in a statement issued Thursday, April 20, that recent actions taken by the US government relating to the issuance of entry visas, heightened security vetting, and restrictions on electronic devices in aircraft cabins, have had a direct impact on consumer interest and demand for air travel into the US.

"...over the past 3 months, we have seen a significant deterioration in the booking profiles on all our US routes, across all travel segments," it said. "Emirates has, therefore, responded as any profit-oriented enterprise would, and we will redeploy capacity to serve demand on other routes on our global network."

Of the changes, Emirates said that from May 1 and May 23 respectively, its Fort Lauderdale International and Orlando International operations will move from daily to 5x weekly. Then, from June 1 and 2 respectively, its Seattle Tacoma International and Boston operations will move from twice-daily services to a daily service. Finally, from July 1, service to Los Angeles International will move from twice-daily to a daily service.

"We will closely monitor the situation with the view to reinstate and grow our US flight operations as soon as viable," it added.

Commenting on the development to Reuters, fellow Emirati carrier Etihad Airways (EY, Abu Dhabi International) said it has no intention of modifying its US services as it has not seen a significant reduction in demand in recent weeks.