Ethiopian Airlines (Ethiopian) is pleased to announce that it has entered into a code share agreement with Saudi Arabian Airlines. The code share applies to the Addis Ababa-Jeddah-Addis Ababa route, providing customers a wider choice of service. The recently-formalized agreement is a significant step forward in strengthening the relationship between the two airlines.

Under this agreement, the two carriers jointly provide six weekly flights on the Addis Ababa-Jeddah and Jeddah-Addis Ababa routes. Ethiopian currently operates four weekly services from its home base Addis Ababa to Jeddah on Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays while Saudi Arabian flies to Addis Ababa twice weekly on Mondays and Sundays returning to Jeddah on the same day.

Mr. Busera Awel, Vice President Commercial of Ethiopian said, "The new code share agreement underscores our commitment to offer our customers more options of convenient connections to various points."

Mr. Ahmed AlJohani, Saudi Arabian Manager for Ethiopia, stated that the new code-share agreement not only avails more benefits to the customers but also strengthens the partnership of the two carriers.

Ethiopian currently has code share agreements with Lufthansa, Brussels Airlines, South African Airways, Gulf Air, Air One and Kuwait Airways.

About Ethiopian

Ethiopian Airlines, www.ethiopianairlines.com, one of the largest and fastest growing airlines in Africa made its maiden flight to Cairo in 1946. The airline currently serves 53 destinations around the globe, 33 of which are in Africa.

In 2008 Ethiopian was the proud recipient of the Corporate Achievement Award from Aviation & Allied Business, the Brussels Airport Marketing Award on its long haul service, and Best Airline in Africa from the Africa Travel Award-Nigeria.

In 2006 and 2007 Ethiopian also won awards as the African Airline of the Year 2006, Africa Business of the Year 2007 and Ghana Business and Financial Award 2007 from the African Aviation, the African Times/USA and the Government of Ghana respectively for its outstanding performance in the commercial air transport industry.

Ethiopian will be the first carrier to operate the 787 Dreamliner in Africa, the Middle East and Europe.

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