Airbaltic may have to pay back EUR 81m in state aid
04.10.2012, 13:10Latvian national airline airBaltic may have to pay back EUR 81m in state aid that it received from the Latvian state in 2011 after the airline stopped doing business with its CEO and shareholder Bertold Flick.
Acting reportedly on the information received from Flick,
the European Commission launched an investigation at the end of 2011 into whether such a capital injection was in line with the rules regulating state aid to state enterprises.
No decision has formally been made yet.
Speaking at the Latvian TV5 show "Uncensored",
Janis Vanags, vice president for corporate communications of airBaltic, said that he hoped that the European Commission would not demand airBaltic to pay back the amount because similar cpaital injections during crisis years have been made also in other airlines, including
Czech Airlines and Air Malta.
Vanags added that the fact that airBaltic has been successfully restructured is also speaking in its favour