Lufthansa Boosts Flights to Asia

German flag carrier Lufthansa plans to boost by 50 percent its flights to China by 2007, company chairman Wolfgang Mayrhuber told Sunday's Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung. Already the European airline with the most connections between Europe and China, Lufthansa wants to increase its number of weekly flights there to around 60, he told the weekly newspaper. Mayrhuber also said India was being targeted and that his company plans to raise the number of passenger flights there by about 60 percent and lift the number of freight links by 70 percent. "Our Asian business will grow altogether by at least 15 percent by 2007", he said. The number of passengers travelling in Asia with Lufthansa grew by 27 percent in the first eight months of the year compared to the same period in 2003 as fears decreased about the respiratory lung illness SARS. (AFP)