Lufthansa union calls 2-day pilots’ strike

BERLIN: The pilots’ union for Lufthansa, Europe’s biggest air transport group, on Saturday called for a two-day strike in Germany from Monday over a salary and pensions dispute.

The airline has already been hit by four strikes this year, the last one on Friday by another union.

This latest two-day action will hit flights run by the main airline Lufthansa and its subsidiaries CityLine and Eurowings, said a statement from the Vereinigung Cockpit (VC) union. It will also affect Lufthansa Cargo.

But the union said that given the situation in the Middle East, flights to certain destinations — Azerbaijan, Egypt, Bahrain, Iraq, Israel, Yemen, Jordan, Qatar, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates — would not be affected.

The last pilots’ strike affecting the airlines was in March.

The UFO union, which organised Friday’s strike, said it had forced the cancellation of 90 percent of flights at the two airlines targeted, Lufthansa and Cityline.