Alitalia's shares fell to a 2007 low on Monday on worries over its sale by the Italian government after one of the two bidders, Russia's Aeroflot, expressed concern about the price tag.

Aeroflot denied a report by Russian news agency Interfax that it had pulled out of the bidding for the government's 49.9 percent stake but said a purchase would depend on price.

"Everything depends on the conditions," Irina Dannenberg, spokeswoman for Aeroflot, said. "We are not happy with the (price) conditions and do not intend to buy Alitalia at (just) any price."

Alexander Lebedev, the majority owner of National Reserve Corporation (NRK) which owns 30 percent of Aeroflot, said he was "negative" about the deal and believed the Russian airline's management was taking its cues from the Kremlin.

"I can only suppose that they are listening to the government, which has a 51 percent stake, but I do not have a high opinion of the government or of the management of Aeroflot," he said at the Le Bourget air show outside Paris.

Another representative of NRK said the Russian airline was worried that a high price would make restructuring Alitalia, which loses 30 million euros a month, too difficult.

"They expressed dissatisfaction with the organizational procedures for the tender, which in Aeroflot's opinion would not allow it to be effective in leading the company out of its crisis and are aimed at gaining the maximum price," Leonid Dushatin, a member of NRK's board of directors said.

"This is the main reason for Aeroflot's pessimism."

Formal internal discussion on the bid is likely to take place at an Aeroflot board meeting on June 23, he said. Binding offers must be submitted by July 2.

The other bidder for the Alitalia stake is Italian airline Air One, owned by businessman Carlo Toto, which is working with the country's biggest retail bank, Intesa Sanpaolo.

Observers point out that Alitalia loses more in a year than Air One manages in turnover and say it would be ironic for the government to sell to Aeroflot, because it is also majority state-owned.

Last month a US private equity consortium including TPG pulled out of the bidding.

Aeroflot said this month it had picked four banks to arrange an EUR800 million euro (USD$1.1 billion) credit to fund its bid, including its bidding partner UniCredit.