MOSCOW, February 9. /TASS/. In February, Aeroflot will resume regular flights from Moscow to Alma-Ata (Kazakhstan), Baku (Azerbaijan), Yerevan (Armenia), and New Delhi (India), the airline said on Tuesday.

At the same time, Aeroflot also increased the frequency of flights to Nur-Sultan (Kazakhstan), Minsk (Belarus), Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan), and Cairo (Egypt), and opened flights from St. Petersburg to Minsk.

Deputy Minister of Transport Igor Chalik said earlier that Russian airlines will increase passenger traffic by about 52% in 2021 to around 105 mln people. He added that Russian airlines may carry around 30 mln passengers on international flights in 2021, up by 57% compared with 2020. "We expect the results of 2021 to be even higher than in 2019 on domestic flights, whereas on international flights -to amount to roughly 60% [of 2019 level], meaning around 30 mln passengers,"he said, adding that in terms of financials this year is expected to be better for air carriers than 2020.

Russian airlines carried 69.24 mln passengers in 2020, a decrease of 46% compared with the previous year, according to the data provided by the Federal Aviation Agency. Meanwhile, airlines carried slightly over 13 mln people on international destinations in the period, down by 76.2%, whereas on domestic destinations the passenger flow decreased by 23.1% to 56.15 mln passengers. 2019 was a record year for Russian carriers as they carried 128.1 mln passengers, up by 10.3% compared with 2018.