Bulgaria, BiH mull setting up joint Regional Airline

SOFIA, April 13 (Xinhua) — Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borissov and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) Denis Zvizdic have discussed setting up a joint airline of the Balkan region, they said Friday.
The new regional airline would operate flights between capital cities of those countries that do not have their own national airlines such as BiH, Macedonia and Albania, Zvizdic said at a joint press conference after the talks.
The distance between Sofia and Sarajevo is about 600 km and would take 40 minutes by plane, but there are currently no direct flights, which poses a problem for businesspeople and other travelers, Zvizdic said.
Transport infrastructure is the hold up in the economic development of the Western Balkans, and its regional and European Union (EU) integration in a wider sense, Zvizdic said.
Borissov said in turn that he had asked the transport minister to work on the idea of the regional airline, which four or five countries may initially subsidize, he said.
As for the infrastructure projects in the region, Borissov said that each country should make efforts to finish its part.
Zvizdic, who paid a two-day official visit to Bulgaria at the invitation of Borissov, met on Thursday with Bulgarian President Rumen Radev.