Portugal demands damages from Swissair

TAP Air Portugal posted losses of SFr147 million last year Keystone Archive

The Portuguese government is seeking €275 million (SFr404 million) in damages from Switzerland's collapsed national carrier, Swissair.

The government has filed a lawsuit in Zurich, claiming the Swissair Group reneged on a commitment to take a 34 per cent stake in the state-owned airline TAP Air Portugal, according to a report in the Publico newspaper.

The report comes a day after the French airline, Air Lib, and its parent company, Holco SAS, launched legal proceedings against subsidiaries of Swissair.

The two companies, which filed the lawsuits in France and Switzerland, are claiming SFr670 million ($405.3 million) in damages. They argue that an agreement concluded with Swissair in August this year had not been respected.

Both French companies have also expressed their right to an additional SFr89 million ($53.8 million), which they say Swissair owes them as former shareholder. Swissair formerly had a 49.5 per cent stake in AOM/Air Liberté.

Other lawsuits have been launched since Swissair collapsed. The Belgian authorities and Belgium’s national carrier, Sabena, have filed a SFr1.47 billion lawsuit against the Swiss carrier, which had a 49.5 per cent stake in Sabena.

On Monday a Zurich judge granted Swissair formal protection from creditors for a further six months.

Debt moratorium confirmed

Bankruptcy judges in Zurich and Bülach have confirmed a six-month debt moratorium to six subsidiaries of Switzerland’s collapsed airline, Swissair.

Swissair lawyer, Edith Blunschi, and the former provisional administrator of the Swissair Group, Karl Wüthrich, repeatedly stressed that refusing the moratorium would have bad consequences for the employers and their employees.

SAirGroup (now Swissair Group), SAirLines, Flightlease, Swissair Schweizerische Luftverkehrs AG, Swisscargo and Cargologic have been granted the moratorium until June 2002.

swissinfo with agencies