Air Malta, which already operates flights from Reggio Calabria to Rome five times a week, inaugurated flights linking the southern Italian city to Barcelona last week.

At a press conference held at the comune’s offices, Palazzo San Giorgio, Reggio’s mayor, Giuseppe Scopelliti, introduced the new flights.

Last year, the city launched a programme called “A Passport for Europe” and began implementing this by sending young Reggio students to Malta to study English. This proved to be very popular with the young people of Reggio and around 2,000 came on the programme. This year, the city is opening up a parallel programme in Barcelona for the study of Spanish while the Malta programme is also being continued.

The Air Malta flights to Barcelona will be once a week, on Sundays, and will be of 10 weeks’ duration.