Xiamen Airlines of China will fly to the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) twice a week from Fuzhou, China, beginning April 27, Malaysian Transport Minister Ling Liong Sik said Saturday.

He said this would help foster relations between the peoples of China and Malaysia, as the latter had quite a number of people in the local Chinese community who came from that province decades ago and settled here.

"They can take this opportunity to visit Fuzhou and promote roots travel (travelling to trace roots of a person) through the new flights. We also expect ties between the two nations, which have been improving, to become closer," he told reporters after meeting a delegation of Xiamen Airlines at a leading hotel in Petaling Jaya near here.

He said the flight arrangement was also in line with Malaysia's aim to promote relations with China in tourism.

The number of Chinese tourists visiting Malaysia had been climbing steadily with 160,000 arrivals in 1998, 190,000 in 1999, 420,000 in 2000 and 450,000 last year, according to the minister.

He said in an effort to attract more Chinese tourists, the government had relaxed regulations to allow visitors from China to obtain their visa approvals easily.

He said his ministry would further discuss with Xiamen Airlines ways to increase the frequency of flights, and one possibility was providing them with incentives like a discount in aircraft parking charges.

"The cost of operating in Malaysia is cheap and when they fly in they bring in tourists, which means other industries like hotels and tours stand to gain," Ling said.

He observed the airline industry worldwide was picking up again after it had experienced a slump following the September 11 terrorist attacks on the United States.

Currently, China Southern Airlines flies twice a week both from Shanghai and Guangzhou to Kuala Lumpur.

(People's Daily March 17, 2002)