Passengers of the German airline “Lufthansa“ (Lufthansa) should prepare for mass cancellations of flights due to an upcoming strike by pilots on Thursday and Friday (March 12 and 13), the German news agency DPA reported.
The pilots' union “Vereinigung Cockpit“ (VC) has called on more than 5,000 employees to join the 48-hour strike. Flights operated by the parent company “Lufthansa“ as well as by its subsidiary “Lufthansa Cargo“ will be affected. For the first time, the regional airline “Lufthansa Cityline“ will also be included in the strike.
No strikes on flights to the Middle East
Due to the tense situation in air traffic to the Middle East, the union refrained from strike action last week. Flights to the region will be excluded from the announced strike.
According to the union, this applies to connections with Egypt, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Iraq, Israel, Yemen, Jordan, Qatar, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Pilots from the three airlines affected by the strike have already voted in support of the protest actions. At the subsidiary “Eurowings“ (Eurowings) voting continues until Monday (March 16), which is why its pilots will not participate in the strikes this week.
Second round of strikes
For the parent company “Lufthansa“, this is the second round of strike action within the framework of the ongoing collective labor dispute. On February 12, pilots stopped work for 24 hours, when more than 800 flights were canceled and around 100,000 passengers were affected.
According to the union, the strike is the result of deadlocked negotiations over pension schemes at “Lufthansa“ and “Lufthansa Cargo“.
The chairman of the “Vereinigung Cockpit“ union, Andreas Pinheiro, said that the company had not made a concrete proposal so far. He said it was not enough to declare readiness for negotiations without agreeing on substantial improvements to pension schemes.
The spokesman for the negotiating committee, Arne Carstens, also accused “Lufthansa“ of blocking progress in the negotiations. According to him, the seven rounds of talks, the long periods of discussion and the offer of mediation have so far yielded no results.
He said new negotiations would only take place after a concrete proposal was presented that could be the subject of negotiations.