Miami: Lufthansa, Europe's largest airline, does not see the potential to add new services to the Middle East and North Africa, believing that the market is firmly dominated by the major regional competitors.
"There is no major expansion plans to that part of the world because there are some other players in that part of the world who have major expansion plans," Carsten Spohr, Deutsche Lufthansa chief executive and chairman, told reporters in Miami on Sunday.
Lufthansa and it's other group airlines which includes Swiss and Austrian fly to around 20 destinations in the region from Iran to Morocco, according to its website.
However, the Gulf's largest airlines - Emirates, Etihad Airways and Qatar Airways - have similar networks, often flying multiple daily frequencies, in and out of their hubs connecting onto long-haul routes to Europe and North and South America that Lufthansa also serve.
"My expansion plans are to go to other destinations where we have a chance to operate profitably," Spohr said at a press conference ahead of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) Annual General Meeting starting on Monday.
Lufthansa, which operates hubs out of Frankfurt and Munich, has long warned about the growth of the major Gulf airlines that transport East-West passenger traffic through their Middle Eastern hubs. Spohr said the allegations by the US' biggest carriers has made Lufthansa's argument "more credible."
US carriers Delta, United and American allege the Gulf carriers have received billions of dollars in government subsidies and want their government to freeze additional routes to Gulf airlines until their claims are investigated.
However, Spohr said that in Europe existing bilateral agreements should remain unchanged until the European Union decides what, if any, action to take. Last month, the Dutch government froze landing rights to Gulf carriers.
