Francois Hollande arrived on Monday, May 4 at Doha, Qatar, accompanied by the ministers of foreign affairs and defense, Laurent Fabius and Jean-Yves Le Drian, to attend the official signing of two contracts . 24 Rafale combat aircraft to the emirate
Qatar had set a condition for the purchase of these 24 aircraft: obtaining additional traffic rights to France for the airline, Qatar Airways. The emirate has been successful. Qatar Airways aircraft, already serving Paris, will now be able to land at Lyon and Nice, probably three times a week.
The blow is hard for Air France. The French company in difficulty, already struggling to withstand competition from Gulf companies. This time it will be even harder. Because by moving to French regional airports, Qatari aircraft may divert traffic to the Doha hub, at the expense of Paris.
This decision penalizes the French company even as it tries to recover
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It could even worsen the situation because Air France will be -be forced to revise its flights. But when a long haul aircraft is withdrawn from the fleet, they are 300 direct jobs and less.
The decision is all the more incomprehensible it is taken by the state, which is a shareholder in the airline (16%). The risk is now to have created a precedent. The UAE, which, too, interested in combat aircraft, could make the same request to the French authorities for their airline Etihad
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