OREANDA-NEWS. On 02 April 2008 was announced, that German airlines Lufthansa, the largest foreign carrier in Russia, transferred all its Moscow flights from Sheremetyevo to Moscow International Airport Domodedovo. Lufthansa is the leader of Star Alliance, one of the biggest air carriers’ alliances in the world. Currently, six members of the alliance – Swiss, Thai Airways, Singapore Airlines, Austrian Airlines, bmi and Spanair – have been operating in Domodedovo. Thus, one Moscow airport will have most of Star Alliance members.

Lufthansa will connect Domodedovo with five German cities – Berlin, Hamburg, Dusseldorf and Frankfurt. The airline will be operating 69 services to Domodedovo per week. Its first flight Lufthansa performed tonight. The first flight LH3196 from Munich performed by Airbus A319 landed tonight at 2 hrs 15 min.

"We have spent few years on negotiations and 9 months for preparing the shift of Lufthansa operations to Domodedovo airport. Enormous work has been accomplished to upgrade and renovate the airport infrastructure and our efforts have proven to be effective. Domodedovo was recognized the best airport in Eastern Europe and we are prepared to offer our passngers and our new partner proven quality service".

Lufthansa’s own business lounge in Domodedovo airport, self-service kiosks as well as the Star Alliance back office have been made available for the airline’s passengers.

Lufthansa remains the leader among foreign carriers operating in Russia and CIS. Currently, Lufthansa offers over 200 direct flights from 18 CIS cities (Alna-Aty, Ashgabat, Astana, Baku, Donetsk, Kazan, Kiev, Moscow, Nizhniy Novgorod, Perm, Rostov-on-Don, Samara, St.-Petersburg, Tbilisi, Ufa and Yerevan) to Germany and other countries worldwide. The airlines’ route network covers 207 destinations in 81 countries.

Moscow International Airport Domodedovo is the largest and most dynamically developing airports in Russia and holds leading position among Moscow airports in terms of passengers traffic. In 2007 Domodedovo welcomed 18 755 098 passengers and recorded the growth rate at 22% against 2006. According to last year’s performance results, Moscow International Airport Domodedovo achieved remarkable developments including the first place in terms growth rate in its group by ACI Europe, and honorable 19th place among European airports. Within last two years, world’s leading carriers including Thai Airways, China Eastern, Iberia, Eurofly, Singapore Airlines, Wind Jet, bmi, Royal Jordanian Airlines, Austrian Airlines, and JAL started operating in Domodedovo.