Low-fare carrier Ryanair has announced changes to its European network, including a new route from its contentious Belgian Charleroi base and the closure of recently opened intra-Nordic services.
In Charleroi yesterday, the Irish airline's chief executive, Mr Michael O'Leary, said it was confident of retaining links with the Brussels airport despite an expected European Commission competition ruling against a 20-year discount deal between the two parties.
With a decision due before June 2004, Mr O'Leary said: "We call on the Commission to rule in favour of Brussels Charleroi which complied with the market investor principle in offering Ryanair and other airlines a low cost base."
Mr O'Leary also said pulling out of Charleroi would be the last option available to the airline. In the event of a negative ruling, Ryanair would first enter into talks with the Commission, appeal the outcome of the investigation or encourage the publicly owned airport to part-privatise.
Mr Serge Kubla, economics minister with the Walloon regional government, which owns the airport, told the same news conference up to seven private investors were interested in acquiring a stake in it.
The airport, one of Ryanair's nine European hubs, serves a 13 destinations, including Dublin and Shannon.
Four new routes are also being phased in from next month from London Stansted to Linz in Austria, Bari in Italy, Erfurt in Germany and Jerez in Spain. These replace four routes being cancelled from January 14th between Stansted and Belgium's Ostend, Maastricht in the Netherlands and the French airports of Reims and Clermont Ferrand.
New services are also being introduced between Stockholm Skavsta and Italian cities Rome and Milan, replacing Nordic services between Skavsta and Oslo Torp, Tampere and Aarhus - all of which had load factors under Ryanair's average of 80 per cent, according to a company spokesperson.
Noting Ryanair would shortly announce a 10th European airport base, Mr O'Leary added: "There has been far too much inaccurate speculation that the EU investigation will bring an end to Ryanair's growth. It won't." -(Additional reporting Reuters)
