Australian low-cost carrier Jetstar will launch direct flights between Colombo and Australia in August 2026, Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath announced following his official visits to Australia and New Zealand.
Herath said discussions with the airline during his Australia leg resulted in Jetstar agreeing to operate direct services to Colombo, NewsFirst reported. He did not disclose the Australian city pairings, weekly frequency, or pricing structure. Jetstar is the Melbourne-headquartered subsidiary of Qantas, and an Australian rotation would represent the first low-cost direct link between the two countries in recent years.
The announcement is expected to support tourism, trade and people-to-people exchanges between Sri Lanka and Australia, the foreign minister said. Sri Lanka’s tourism authority has been targeting the Australian market as part of a broader push to diversify away from over-reliance on Indian and European traffic, and the Australian–Sri Lankan diaspora is one of the largest English-speaking expatriate communities globally.
The Jetstar announcement caps the Australia–New Zealand foreign visit in which Herath also secured an investor roadshow for Port City Colombo in Melbourne, pitched trade and tourism cooperation with Victorian state MPs, and observed Australia’s Parliamentary Question Time. Australia and New Zealand also pledged to back Sri Lanka’s accession to the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership trade bloc.
Source: NewsFirst.
