OREANDA-NEWS. From 19 December this year the Belarusian airline BelAvia will launch direct flights from Vilnius International Airport (VIA) to Minsk.

The flights to the capital of Belarus will be operated 8 times a week by aircraft CRJ-100/200 with 50 passenger seats. Tickets are already available in Lithuanian travel agencies and online.

“When taking a decision to launch flights on this route, we first of all thought about our passengers who currently travel from Minsk to Vilnius. On the other hand, this route will be particularly convenient to transit passengers from the CIS countries wishing to travel through Minsk to European cities. As our flights will begin in December, we are expecting a large flow of pre-holiday and holiday tourism and shopping travel enthusiasts,” BelAvia Managing Director Anatoly Gusarov said.

The aircraft from Minsk National Airport (Minsk-2) will land and take off from Vilnius on Mondays, Saturdays and Sundays as many as two times and one time on Fridays and Thursdays. The economy class ticket of one of the shortest – barely 40 minute-long – flights in Europe costs from EUR 62 (about LTL 214).

“We are happy about the successful negotiations with BelAvia, which will make the last-minute corrections in our winter schedule by adding another valuable direct flight. The cooperation between Belarusian air carriers and VIA is highly mutually beneficial – it is a convenient and fast travel option for the flows of passengers, in particular business and tourism shopping lovers, from Minsk, whereas for the air carriers already operating in VIA it is a way to generate an additional traffic of transit passengers for connecting and more remote flights to Europe. We are convinced that this route will enhance a positive economic impact on Vilnius Region and Lithuania determined by the growth in arriving passenger traffic,” said VIA Managing Director Gediminas Almantas.

Vilnius will become the 46th regular route of the Belarusian airline BelAvia from Minsk. This route will supplement the VIA map of regular flights as the 36th route connecting the 43rd airport in the 22nd country located at a distance of a direct flight from the capital of Lithuania to the range of routes already offered by VIA.