Sri Lankan Airlines expanded its code share deal with Malaysian Airlines increasing its reach to the United States, Australia and Asia-Pacific sectors.

The agreement enables Malaysia Airlines to codeshare on SriLankan’s flights to Male in the Maldives while SriLankan Airlines will access Los Angeles, Sydney, Melbourne, Jakarta, and Seoul through Malaysia Airlines.

The two airlines have been codesharing between Kuala Lumpur and Colombo since 1999.

Codesharing arrangements give Sri Lankan access to destinations it does not fly to, and also helps increase revenue by agents being able to book passengers on SriLankan to such destinations.

"The partnership gives SriLankan access to several markets in the Asia-Pacific, notably the US west coast and Australia," said Mr. Mohamed Fazeel, SriLankan's head of sales.

"This will provide our customers with easy access to the Maldives, a favorite destination among high end tourists from Europe and Asia, The loads to the major cities in North America, Asia and Australia will also be increased", said head of industry relations, Malaysia Airlines, Germal Singh Khera.