It is not often that Willie Walsh and Michael O'Leary may be on the same side, or at least share similar sentiments. But the growing convergence of leading US airlines and certain European carriers over the threat posed by the Gulf airlines must hint of such a paradox. In December, Lufthansa and Air France-KLM wrote to the European Commission (CEC) demanding that traffic rights be withdrawn from Emirates, Qatar Airways and Etihad. Their grounds were that the Gulf big three were acting in an uncompetitive manner as a result of receiving government subsidies. Almost simultaneously, the US airlines Delta, United and American asked much the same of the Obama Administration. They assert that the Gulf big three have received some $40bn over the decade in subsidies - soft loans, subsidised airport charges, lower labour costs due to curbs on unions, infrastructure investment and such like.
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