Qatar Air formally responds to US carriers' subsidy claims
- BTN News
- Friday, 31 July 2015
It says its flights do not harm any US carrier and it does not compete against any US airline on non-stop routes. It also serves cities that have never featured on US carrier networks.
Qatar ceo Akbar Al Baker said: “We are concerned to see the Big 3 seek to change the rules of the game ... and the US government should reject calls to freeze the US-Qatar Open Skies Agreement."
Meanwhile, the US Partnership for Open & Fair Skies (a coalition including the Big 3) has released a new report continuing the campaign against Gulf airlines.
Written by Aaron Klein, a former deputy assistant secretary for economic policy within the US Treasury, the report sees “clear parallels from the decline of the domestic shipbuilding industry to the present-day trade dispute with the subsidised carriers”.
The Partnership insists that Qatar, Emirates and Etihad all received more than US$42 billion in “subsidies and other unfair benefits from their government owners in the past decade, in violation of Open Skies agreements”.