China Southern Airlines Sunday opened a direct route from Guangdong Province in the south to far west Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, making it the country's longest domestic flight.

An Airbus A330 from Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong, arrived at 2:10 p.m. Sunday at the Kashgar International Airport in Kashgar, China's western-most city.

The flight, which covered 4,852 km in 6.5 hours, carried a delegation of Guangdong government officials and businessmen to attend a commodity fair for central and south Asia, to be held Monday in Kashgar.

The airline has scheduled a round-trip flight between Guangzhou and Kashgar beginning July 15. The flight will stop at Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang, for 40 minutes due to technical demands, the company said.

Hu Wei, vice chairman of Xinjiang's regional government, said the flight would be of great significance to develop economic ties between the two regions.

According to a "pairing assistance" support scheme issued by the central government, the economically developed Guangdong Province began providing assistance to boost the development of Kashgar Prefecture, formerly an important hub on the ancient Silk Road, in May.