Merpati to serve Tawao

JAKARTA (JP): Merpati Nusantara Airlines, a subsidiary of the country's flag carrier Garuda Indonesia, will start serving a new route linking Balikpapan in East Kalimantan with Tawao in East Malaysia on Sunday, an executive said yesterday.

"The new service is expected to support sub-regional cooperation involving Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines," Merpati's manager for East Kalimantan, Gatot Budiono, was quoted by Antara as saying in Balikpapan.

He added that Merpati will serve the route with a Foker 28 aircraft on Thursdays and Sundays.

Merpati started services between Pekanbaru in Riau with Johor in Malaysia and Ambon in Maluku with Darwin in Australia last month.

The opening of the Balikpapan-Tawao route will increase the number of regional routes served by Merpati to nine, including the Kupang-Darwin, Denpasar-Port Hedland (Australia), Bandung- Singapore, Pontianak-Singapore and Pekanbaru-Singapore.(31)