{"id":5270,"date":"2016-07-14T09:50:49","date_gmt":"2016-07-14T09:50:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/?p=5270"},"modified":"2016-07-11T10:06:04","modified_gmt":"2016-07-11T10:06:04","slug":"awex-launched-portoroz-belgrade-flights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/sl\/awex-launched-portoroz-belgrade-flights\/","title":{"rendered":"AWEX Launched Portoro\u017e \u2013 Belgrade Flights"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Start-up airline AWEX Croatia has secured a Swiss charter contract to operate services from Zurich to Belgrade via Portoro\u017e. Flights are expected to operate once per week until September 24, each Saturday, with a 34-seat Saab 340B turboprop, with exception to today\u2019s inaugural service which will run with a smaller ten-seat aircraft<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Flights could be extended if there is sufficient demand, however, tour operators such as MedAdria and Fly Fly Travel only recently began selling packages. A Polish Air Operator\u2019s Certificate (AOC) will be used. AWEX previously planned to maintain flights from Rijeka, Zadar and Bra\u010d to the Serbian capital during the summer, in addition to Portoro\u017e. Services between Belgrade and Portoro\u017e were last operated in 2010 by Jat Airways but were suspended due to a lack of aircraft.<\/p>\n<p>The head of the Portoro\u017e Tourist Board,\u00a0<strong>Igor Novel,<\/strong>\u00a0says the route will attract Serbian holidaymakers visiting both Slovenia and Switzerland.\u00a0<em>\u201cSerbs are becoming an increasingly important category of tourists due to the ownership structure of the Kempinski Hotel\u201d<\/em>, Mr Novel said. The Kempinski Palace Hotel in Portoro\u017e is owned by Serbian businessman Miodrag Kosti\u0107 whose company, the MK Group, recently expressed interest in purchasing Portoro\u017e Airport as well. According to Mr Novel, the new route is an opportunity to attract wealthier Swiss and Serbian guests to the coastal Slovenian city. The Vice President of the Supervisory Board of the Tourism Association,<strong>\u00a0Tomi Matja\u017e<\/strong>, says,\u00a0<em>\u201cThe effects of the new route won\u2019t be felt overnight but this is an attempt to get things moving\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Commenting on the new service, the General Manager of Portoro\u017e Airport,\u00a0<strong>Robert Krajnc,<\/strong>\u00a0says,\u00a0<em>\u201cThe first few flights won\u2019t be as full since sales have just begun but all such projects require time. It is necessary to be patient\u201d. He adds that Portor\u017e Airport could be used by travellers visiting the nearby Istria region in Croatia. \u201cThis was certainly the case when Jat Airways used to fly here and the flights were full\u201d,<\/em>\u00a0Mr Krajnc notes. Portoro\u017e Airport, which has no scheduled flights, handled 22.975 passengers last year. AWEX Croatia, established in 2012, is linked to businessman Marijan Tu\u0161kan, who managed Croatia\u2019s first privately owned airline, Air Adriatic.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><em>Kongres Magazine<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Photo:\u00a0Trnkoczy, slovenia.info<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Start-up airline AWEX Croatia has secured a Swiss charter contract to operate services from Zurich to Belgrade via Portoro\u017e. Flights are expected to operate once per week until September 24, each Saturday, with a 34-seat Saab 340B turboprop, with exception to today\u2019s inaugural service which will run with a smaller ten-seat aircraft. Flights could be [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5121,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-5270","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bureau-news"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/sl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/sl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/sl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/sl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/sl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/sl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/sl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5121"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/sl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/sl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.slovenia-convention.com\/sl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}