Budget carrier Ryanair has announced that it will open a new base at Sofia Airport from 30 October and launch a new winter routes to the Bulgarian capital city from Liverpool and Glasgow.

Ryanair’s newest airport base will have three aircraft and offer 21 international routes in total, which will deliver over 1.5 million passengers and support 1,100 “on-site” jobs per year, the company said in a statement on Wednesday.

“This significant growth is an integral part of our continued expansion plans for both Bulgaria and Eastern Europe, as we connect Sofia with Europe’s key centres of business, including Berlin, Brussels, Dublin, London, Madrid and Milan,” Ryanair’s Chief Commercial Officer, David O’Brien, commented in the statement

Ryanair also said that it would launch a new twice weekly Liverpool winter service to/from Sofia beginning on 31 October.

"We are delighted to see Ryanair add to its list of destinations served from Liverpool and particularly as Sofia is a city not currently served from here, further improving the Liverpool City Region's connectivity across Europe," Robin Tudor, Head of PR for Liverpool John Lennon Airport said in a separate statement.

Ryanair also announced the further expansion to its Glasgow International winter 2016 schedule with a new route to Sofia, to be serviced twice weekly.