Cuba and Denmark will launch direct flights Wednesday to accommodate Europe's winter-time vacationers, the Tourism Ministry said.

Some 250 travelers will take the inaugural flight from Denmark's Copenhagen, and head for Cuba's Caribbean resort of Varadero, 140 km east of Havana, it said.

The fortnightly flight will last throughout the winter tourism season and operate every other Wednesday, allowing a greater number of international "consumers of sun and sand, nature and culture" to visit Cuba, the ministry said.

The Copenhagen-Varadero flight is operated by carrier Jetair aboard a Boeing 767-300, it said.

Tourism is Cuba's second largest source of foreign reserve after medical services exports, bringing in $2.5 billion and some 2.8 million visitors a year, with nearly half of them Canadian.