Pegasus Airlines is expanding its international network by opening flights to the Georgian capital Tbilisi and the Ukrainian city of Kharkov. General manager Sertac Haybat says Beirut was the airline's 23rd destination and that it will introduce flights to Sofia by the beginning of October. "Next are Kharkov and Tbilisi," he adds. Pegasus' Beirut service will also become a daily operation by 1 November. Fast-growing Pegasus aims to carry more than 8 million passengers this year, sharply up against the 5.8 million it carried in 2009.
Turkish Airlines and Lufthansa's joint carrier SunExpress is to open connections to Germany from several cities in the Anatolian region of Turkey from November. SunExpress says it will operate from Adana, Ankara, Elazig, Gaziantep, Kayseri, Malatya, Samsun and Trabzon to the German destinations including Frankfurt, Munich, Stuttgart and Dusseldorf.
Chief executive Paul Schwaiger says that Ankara will be a new destination in the carrier's network. "We believe that the new flights will meet a significant demand between Anatolian cities, especially our new destination the capital city Ankara, and Germany," he says.
Meanwhile Atlasjet and Turkish Airlines have both unveiled moves into Russia. Atlasjet is entering the Russian aviation market by setting up an airline in conjunction with the Omsk regional government and construction firm Mostovik. Atlasjet says the airline aims to start operations in May 2011, initially operating three aircraft. The company has yet to be branded and its choice of aircraft identified. Under a second phase the partnership will extend to modernising and operating Omsk International Airport's passenger and cargo terminal from 2013.
Turkish Airlines is seeking a partner in Russia after opting to open an Ankara-Moscow route through its Anadolu Jet division. The flag-carrier's Russian representative, Mefail Deribas, says it is working on plans to co-operate with Russian airlines.
"Russia is one of our emerging markets," he says, adding that it has increased the number of Russian passengers it transports by a factor of 10 since 2005, to 600,000 last year. Moscow-Ankara flights will start in late October, he says, operating three times per week.
Source: Flight Daily News
