"We are taking some steps to downsize....and we are going to retire eight DC-9 aircraft which are based in North America...and between now and end of October, we shall have retired three Boeing 747 aircraft as well," senior vice president International of Air Canada, Douglas D Port, told Reuters in an interview.

"Next year, we will retire three more Boeing 747-200 aircraft," he said. "But these are being replaced by three A340 and two A330 aircraft,"Port added.

He said that three Boeing 747-400 aircraft will be retained with the airline and not phased out. Currently, Air Canada has a total fleet of 227 aircraft.Last month's 13-day pilots' strike caused a loss of about C$300 million ($193 million) to the airline. "Air Canada does not expect any further labour disruption," he said.

Port said that the A340 aircraft will be mostlydeployed in the Pacific region, parts of Europe and India. "These are slightly smaller aircraft, but more suited to Air Canada's operations," he added.

"The A330s is a new plane for Air Canada. It does not start till November 1999. We will fly them from eastern Canada to European routes," said Port.Air Canada is also looking at new routes which will help the airline to regain profits. "We are looking at a service to Copenhagen," he said.Air Canada expects a net loss for the year after absorbing the cost of the strike by its pilots in September.

"We are continously talking to the Canadian government because we very much want to fly more to HongKong," he said.

Presently, Air Canada has four flights a week to Hong Kong. The airline is seeking to start daily flights from Toronto and Vancouver to HongKong, Port said.

Air Canada is also looking at Taiwan as a new market. "We believe the traffic between Taiwan and Canada is such we should be designated on that route," he added.

Presently, Canada and Taiwanhave an aviation treaty, but only Canadian Air flies on the route, Port said.

He said that the airline was also interested in starting flights to Tokyo, altough it has flights to Osaka. "We would like to focus on these major Pacific routes," he added.

Air Canada also said that the airline will resume four weekly flights to India from this week. The Canadian airline had suspended flights to India in June 1998 for four months because the profitability on the route had fallen during the summer months.

The airline has for the moment dropped plans for increasing its access to the Indian market through code-sharing with Star Alliance partners, Lufthansa and United Airlines Limited.

"Prior to the Indian government carrying out the nuclear test, Air Canada was attempting to work out with the Indian government, the Canadian government and German authorities, to try and achieve greater presence in this market..," he said.

India conducted a series of nuclear tests in May drawing a storm of globaloutrage.

Port said that a block seat arrangement with two Star Alliance partners, Lufthansa and United Airlines, would have helped Air Canada to increase access to India.

But he said a cooling off relations between India and Canada following the tests had frozen the plan.