IDRAK: Issue of contract between Jat and Airbus should be resolved as soon as possible

The State Secretary of Foreign Trade of France, An-Mari Idrak, said today (February 24, 2010) in Belgrade that there was the wish for resolving the issue of the contract between Serbian airliner Jat Airways and Airbus as soon as possible.

After the talks with the Minister of Infrastructure of Serbia, Milutin Mrkonjić, she said that Serbia should get Airbus airplanes as soon as possible since it was in the interest of both Jat and Serbia.

An-Mari Idrak said that it seemed to her that the contract between Jat and Airbus on procurement of eight mid-route airlines was "suspended" and added that Serbian airliner could buy smaller passenger airplanes in France for regional traffic if it wanted.

According to her words, in that case Jat would have to sign a special contract, but Idrak did not specify with which company that contract would be signed.

The Vice President of Airbus, Andreas Kramer, said last week that that European airplane manufacturer intended to start negotiating with Jat Airways on changes in the contract.

Airbus and Jat signed the contract on purchase of eight airplanes in 1998. These airplanes were supposed to be delivered between 2000 and 2005.

- We believe that the number of eight airplanes is much too big for the current situation in Jat. Number of airplanes and their prices must be adapted since the prices from 12 years ago have no connection with the current conditions in the market - the Vice President of Airbus pointed out.

According to the information announced by Jat's management in early 2007, the contract on purchase of airplanes from Airbus was worth about 580m USD, while JAT paid the deposit of 23.5m USD.

Kramer pointed out that the only way for that money to be used was that the contract between Jat and Airbus be modified.