Newspaper: Taiwan, China to launch regular flights on August 31

Jun 23, 2009, 1:36 GMT

Taipei - Taiwan and China will begin regular flights on August 31, ending the six-decade ban on air links imposed by Taipei at the end of the Chinese Civil War ni 1949, a newspaper reported Tuesday.

The China Times quoted an unnamed Transport Ministry source as saying that China told Taiwan Monday that it preferred August 31 as the date for the start of regular flights.

Taipei has no objection to the date, but Taiwanese and Chinese civil aviation authorities have yet to make a formal announcement.

Once the regular flights are launched, Taiwanese and Chinese airlines will operate 270 round-trip flights each week across the Taiwan Strait, up from the current 108 charter flights per week, the paper said.

Ticket prices are expected to fall an average of 15 per cent from the price for seats on cross-strait charter flights, the China Times noted.

After being separated for six decades, Taiwan and China launched holiday charter flights in 2003, which was expanded to weekend charter flights in July 2008 and upgraded to daily charter flights in December.

In talks held on April 26 in Beijing, Taipei and Beijing agreed to turn daily charter flights into regular flights, as cross-strait ties have been improving fast since President Ma Ying-jeou took office in May 2008.

The aviation pact too effect on June 26, but the two sides' authorities and airlines needed time to prepare for regular flights, so China picked August 31 as the date for launching direct flights.