Garuda Indonesia, KLM to boost cooperation

JAKARTA (JP): The national flag carrier Garuda Indonesia and the Dutch airline KLM agreed yesterday to expand their cooperation in commercial flight services, the presidents of the two companies announced.

"We agreed to promote the joint services in the winter and to implement them next summer," Supandi, Garuda's president, and Pieter Bouw, KLM's president, said.

Supandi said that the two companies have agreed to use double flight numbers (GA/KL or KL/GA) for their Indonesia-Netherlands services.

He said that Garuda will handle the seat reservations for KLM's passengers who fly Indonesia's domestic routes, including Denpasar, Yogyakarta, Padang and Ujungpandang.

"KLM will in turn handle the seat reservations for Garuda's passengers who fly to Berlin, Madrid and Vienna via Amsterdam," he added.

He said that the two companies will also operate joint regional services to Denpasar, Surabaya and Medan.

Supandi said that Garuda and KLM have for years been implementing cooperation in aircraft maintenance, the storage and use of spare parts and the training of staff and crew members.

Garuda and KLM have since last month been operating a cargo service between Amsterdam and Jakarta once a week using Boeing 747s. (04)