Croatia Airlines (CA) marked the 15th anniversary of its first international flight on Friday.
CA made its first commercial flight in international transport, linking Zagreb and Frankfurt, on 5 April 1992.
Speaking at a ceremony marking the anniversary, CA general director Ivan Misetic said that the company's goal was to become a regional leader in air transport.
Prime Minister Ivo Sanader, who attended the ceremony, said that CA had given an important contribution to Croatia's international affirmation.
CA today needs to expand its fleet and increase the number of destinations so that it could play a bigger role in Croatia's development and connect capitals in this region, the PM added.
CA started with passenger transport on 5 May 1991 and its first commercial flight was one linking Zagreb and Split.
Since then and up until the end of September this year, CA planes transported 16.85 million passengers, of whom 9.09 were transported on international flights and 5.78 million on domestic ones. The company transported 1.97 million passengers on charter flights.
The CA fleet consists of 11 planes - four Airbus A319 planes, four Airbus A320 planes and three ATR42 planes.
In the next two years the company intends to renew its short-range fleet and replace its ATR42s with Dash 8-Q400 planes.
In 2006 CA earned 31.52 million kuna in net profits, after reporting a loss of 22.77 million kuna the year before. (Hina)