Chinese financial giant Everbright has bought the Albanian capital's main air hub, Tirana International Airport, its management said Friday.

The airport had since 2005 been run by TIA, whose shareholders include German airport manager AviAlliance, German investment and development firm DEG and the Albanian-American Enterprise Fund.

"We are thrilled to announce an era of transformation with China Everbright Limited," TIA CEO Rolf Castro-Vasquez said in a statement, announcing the sale of 100 percent of its shares.

Passengers numbers hit 2 million last year from 600,000 in 2005. TIA has over the past decade invested some 70 million euros ($78 million) in the facility.

Everbright CEO Chen Shuang hailed the deal as a means of promoting trade with ex communist Albania, and a deal "of great significance and value".

The country has been a NATO member since 2009 but was for some decades an ally of Beijing after Tirana broke with the Soviet Union in the early 1960s.

Cathay Pacific flies Boeing 747 over Hong Kong one last time
Hong Kong (AFP) Oct 8, 2016 –

Hong Kong flag carrier Cathay Pacific bid farewell to its Boeing 747 fleet Saturday with a final low-altitude flyby over the city's iconic skyline.

The final route harked back to dramatic images of the planes flying low over rooftops of apartment blocks as they used to approach the old airport on the harbour.

Saturday's flight, codenamed CX8747, flew over the city's famous Victoria Harbour and the former Kai Tak Airport, which closed in 1998 and was considered one of the most challenging places to land an aircraft due to its crowded urban site surrounded by steep mountains.

Around 300 airline staff made a donation of HK$747 ($96) to ride on the venerable aircraft, which was first used by Cathay Pacific in 1979, for the last time, the airline said.

Photos of the last flyby, at an altitude of 610 metres (2,000 feet) were posted on the airline's Facebook page, which showed some 747 fans waving goodbye.

"Goodbye and thank you, our dearest Boeing 747," Adonis Lau said on the airline's Facebook.

"Cathay 747s brought me and my family between HK and our stays in US and Canada during my childhood. I'll miss my time on the upper deck," Denise Ho said.

The airline had said the four-engine 747 aircraft played a significant role in growing Hong Kong into an international aviation hub.

It added the Boeing 747 had spent 3.1 million hours in the air, after its last commercial flight from Tokyo to the southern Chinese city on October 1.

The 400 passenger 747 Jumbo Jet was launched in 1970 and dominated international air travel and cargo over the next decades.