London, Sunday, May 23, 1999: British Airways will launch flights to Tripoli on June 3 - the 75th destination to join the airline’s worldwide network in a decade.

British Airways will be one of the first major carriers to re-introduce services to the Libyan capital since the United Nations lifted sanctions in April 1999. The new service will be the UK’s first non-stop air link with the city. Boeing 737s will fly twice a week, from London Gatwick, on Mondays and Thursdays. A third weekly flight is likely later this summer.

Charles Gurassa, the airline’s Director of Passenger and Cargo Business, said: “Tripoli has great potential as an important business market and an emerging tourist destination, with remarkable archaeological sites. As the 75th new destination opened up by British Airways in ten years, it is further evidence of our desire to serve new markets around the world.”

Twelve other destinations have been joined to British Airways’ network in the past year - Gdansk, Ljubljana, Milan-Malpensa, Trieste and Vilnius in Europe; Cancun and Denver in North and Central America; Havana, San Jose and Tobago, in the Caribbean; Abidjan, in Africa; and Doha, in the Middle East.

This takes the number of destinations served by British Airways to 168 in 88 countries, with 75 of them launched or re-introduced in the past ten years. During this decade, the airline has also cut flights a number of destinations, because changing market conditions have made them unprofitable. Many of them, however, have been taken over by franchise airlines flying them in the name and colours of British Airways.

These, and code-share flights operated with a BA flight code by other airlines, takes the network served by BA flights to 508 destinations. Add services by the airline’s fellow oneworld alliance members, and that expands to more than 700 destinations.

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