Greek private airline Aegean is to start flights to Malta in the summer next year from its Athens hub.

The airline, the biggest in Greece, said it intends to initially operate to Malta on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays all in the afternoon. It eventually plans to add a Sunday flight.

The airline has been growing fast and will add 38 new routes next summer including links from from Heraklion to Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Geneva, Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen, London Gatwick, Metz, Milan (Malpensa), Nantes, Prague, Rome (Fiumicino), Stockholm (Arlanda), Stuttgart and Toulouse.

It will also operate from Rhodes to Amsterdam, Geneva, Larnaca, Lyon, Stuttgart, Tel Aviv and Vienna, as well as from Corfu to Paris and Rome.

New services from Athens will also fly to Paphos (Cyprus), Oslo, Bordeaux, Dubrovnik, Helsinki, Naples, Pisa, Preveza, Riyadh, Tallinn, Tehran, Toulouse and Yerevan.