(Photo/Courtesy of China Southern Airlines)

China airlines continue to increase its efforts in international and regional routes with the opening and increasing the frequency of overseas routes as the summer travel peak is approaching.

Starting from June 16, China Southern Airlines will open a new direct flight from Beijing to Dushanbe, the capital of Tajikistan with two flights per week. Starting from June 25, China Southern will open a new direct flight from Guangzhou, South China's Guangdong Province to Almaty, Kazakhstan with three round trips per week.

Also, starting from June 30, China Southern will open a new direct flight from Guangzhou to Tashkent, Uzbekistan with three round trips per week, followed by a new direct flight from Harbin, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province to Vladivostok, Russia with two round trips per week from July 1.

In addition to the new routes, China Southern will further increase flights on popular routes such as Australia and Southeast Asia. Starting from June 1, the Urumqi-Tbilisi route will be increased from four round trips per week to seven per week. Starting from June 11, the Urumqi-Yerevan route will be increased from two round trips per week to three. Starting from June 12, the Guangzhou-Brisbane route will be increased from five round trips per week to seven.

China Southern's international and regional routes will reach 150, with a planned weekly flight volume of 2,000 flights by then, the airlines said.

On June 24, China Eastern Airlines will launch a direct flight from Xi'an to Istanbul, Turkey. This is the second direct international route to Turkey opened by China Eastern after the Shanghai-Istanbul route, marking a new step in the aviation cooperation between the two countries.

In terms of increasing or resuming routes, Air China will increase the number of direct flights from Chengdu, Southwest China's Sichuan Province to Singapore from the current one flight per day to two flights per day starting from June 20; and increase the number of direct flights from Chengdu to Tokyo to one flight per day starting from June 30.

Spring Airlines will open a round-trip route from Chengdu to Phnom Penh starting from June 25, with one flight per day; and resume a round-trip route from Chengdu Tianfu to Bangkok Suvarnabhumi starting from June 27, with one flight per day.

The expanded flying network came along as China has been continuously expanding its visa-free "circle of friends."

China began to implement a trial visa-free policy on Monday for ordinary passport holders from Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kuwait, and Bahrain, expanding the nation's unilateral visa-free policy to 47 countries.

From June 9, 2025, to June 8, 2026, passport holders from these countries and whose transit does not exceed 30 days may enter China for business, tourism, visiting relatives and friends, exchanges, or transit without a visa.

In the first quarter, China received more than 9 million visits by foreigners, up by more than 40 percent year-on-year. In the first four months, more than 18,000 foreign-invested companies were established in China, up by 12.1 percent year-on-year, according to the Chinese Foreign Ministry.