Court Allows Etihad-Air Berlin Code-shares

An appeals court in Germany has allowed Etihad to continue most of its disputed code-share flights with Air Berlin for the winter schedule ending in March.

The court ruled that Etihad should be allowed to continue its code-share agreement for 26 international routes but rejected its request to continue code-sharing on five domestic German routes.

The court said the international routes could continue as they were in accordance with a bilateral agreement struck between Germany and Abu Dhabi in 2000.

Etihad says code-shares were a key reason why it invested in loss-making Air Berlin in 2012.

The German government said in 2014 that some of the previous approved code-shares were not covered by a traffic rights agreement between Germany and the United Arab Emirates.

It said late last year it would approve about 29 disputed routes for the final time until January 15, a decision that was backed by a lower court in Brunswick.

Etihad, which owns 29 percent of Air Berlin, had sought to appeal that decision and gain a temporary injunction to allow the code-shares to continue at least until the end of the winter flight schedule.