TOP VIETNAMESE HOTELS AWARDED 5-STAR STATUS

Vietnam's National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) has been busy recently awarding 5-star ratings to the county's top hotels. Hanoi's Meritus Westlake, a Singaporean joint-venture, joins the Sofitel Metropole and the Daewoo Hotel as one of Hanoi's three officially recognized 5-star hotels. Meanwhile down in the south of the country, three Ho Chi Minh City hotels have also been awarded a 5-star rating by VNAT. The Caravelle, Sofitel Plaza Saigon and the Equatorial Hotel all received their awards in May. Two Hanoi hotels, the Guoman and the Sunway, also recently received 4-star ratings from VNAT.

New air routes planned for Mekong Region

Regional airlines presented their plans for new routes at the recent Mekong Tourism Forum in Phnom Penh. Angel Airlines is planning to co-operate with Lao Aviation on the Luang Prabang route, Royal Air Cambodge to Siem Reap and Air Mandalay from Bangkok to Mandalay via Chiang Mai. Lao Aviation will increase the frequency of flights from Luang Prabang to Chiang Mai and Hanoi and is also looking at linking Luang Prabang with Dien Bien Phu in northern Vietnam. Meanwhile Royal Air Cambodge have cancelled all their loss-making domestic flights making the profitable Phnom Penh to Siem Reap routing the airlines' only domestic route. Singapore's SilkAir hope to extend to Siem Reap from Phnom Penh in the near future and Vietnam Airlines plan to introduce a new route linking the three countries of Indochina in November. The routing, Hanoi - Vientiane - Phnom Penh - Ho Chi Minh City, would use 78-seat Fokker aircraft. Other planned routes from Vietnam Airlines include Hue-Luang Prabang-Siem Reap and Hanoi-Vientiane-Yangon.