At a time when airline across the world is hit due to slowdown and Air India is facing its worst-ever crisis, Kingfisher Airlines announced the launch of flights on eight international routes before the year-end.

The routes are Delhi-London Heathrow, Delhi-Bangkok, Delhi-Dubai, Mumbai-Bangkok, Mumbai-Dubai and Mumbai-Colombo. These would be the first international flights the airline would launch out of Delhi.

Two more new flights on Mumbai-Singapore and Mumbai-Hong Kong sectors were also announced from the next day. Both these new flights would be daily direct return services and operated by new Airbus A330-200 aircraft, an airline spokesperson said, adding that the bookings for travel on these two sectors would be opened shortly.

From the winter schedule, which begins in October end, the Vijay Mallya-promoted airline would start operating on six more international routes, subject to approval by the civil aviation ministry.

The decision to suspend two of its flights out of Bangalore was taken with a view to "ensure optimal and efficient utilisation of its fleet and looking at the booked loads and yields between September and November," the spokesperson said.

Kingfisher currently operates daily flights between Bangalore and London, its only foreign route.