“The joining today reaffirms Vietnam Airlines’ position as a major carrier in the Southeast Asian region as well as a strategic partner of SkyTeam,” Pham Ngoc Minh, President and CEO of Vietnam Airlines, said at the joining ceremony in Hanoi.

The cooperation will help further develop SkyTeam and its member airlines, generating valuable benefits for passengers and making greater contributions to the international economic integration of Vietnam .

Leo van Wijk, Chairman of the SkyTeam Governing Board, stressed Asia ’s importance and strategic growth market for SkyTeam, saying “by adding 20 new destinations to the SkyTeam network, the joining of Vietnam Airlines marks an important step in this direction.”

Apart from adding new destinations to the SkyTeam Round the World Pass, Vietnam Airlines will enrich the opportunities of the Asia Pass , enabling customers to travel through Asia on a single ticket in a more economical way, said Marie-Joseph Malé, SkyTeam’s Managing Director.

Thanks to the joining, Vietnam Airlines passengers will benefit from convenient and seamless service of international standards on a global network covering more than 850 destinations in 169 countries.

Vietnam Airlines customers can earn and redeem frequent flyer miles when traveling on flights of all other SkyTeam member airlines. Those from the other SkyTeam frequent flyer programmes can achieve the same when flying Vietnam Airlines.

As the national flag carrier of Vietnam , the airline flies 75 routes to 20 domestic and 26 international destinations with more than 290 daily flights.

Operating the young fleet of 70 modern aircraft mainly including Boeing 777, Airbus A330, A321/320s, the airline expects to further expand its fleet to 115 and 165 aircraft by 2015 and 2020, respectively./.