LOT signs cooperation agreement with Lufthansa

Polish airlines LOT and Germany' s Lufthansa signed an agreement on st rategic cooperation yesterday, paving the way for LOT to join the Star Alliance in about a year' s time. This is how long it will take the Polish airline to achieve the required standards allowing it to become the 16th member of Star, which also includes U.S. United Airlines and Scandinavian Airlines (SAS), which in February declared readiness to acquire a stake in LOT. The deal comprises of a code-sharing agreement, based on which Lu fthansa and LOT will jointly offer all connections between key German and Polish cities. Meanwhile, Lufthansa president Juergen Weber stressed that yesterday' s deal will have no implications for the ownership structure of LOT, in which the State Treasury has a 68% stake. Treasury Minister Wieslaw Kaczmarek yesterday said that this stake would gradually be reduced to 10%, partly through a public offering. However, first the fate of the LOT shares belonging to bankrupt Swissair has to be decided, said Kaczmarek. (Puls Biznesu, p.1; Prawo i Gospodarka, p. 2) T.J.