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EU expected to face WTO criticism in Airbus dispute
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A World Trade Organisation report on aid for European planemaker Airbus, is today expected to condemn the European Union for illegal subsidies.
The 1,000-page report was issued confidentially to the European Union and United States in March, and sources familiar with it said at the time a panel of WTO experts found some payments challenged by the United States were prohibited export subsidies and must be stopped within 90 days.
They said the document, the latest stage in a decades-long transatlantic dispute over the multi-trillion-dollar market for large passenger aircraft, would back many of the US complaints.
Airbus rival Boeing hopes the report on Airbus will stop the EU from subsidising the new A350 plane, which will compete with the US company’s 787 Dreamliner.
The European aircraft manufacturer builds the wings for all its airliners at its Broughton aerospace complex, Flintshire.
Work on a new factory for A350 wing assembly, backed with £340m of loans from the UK’s Coalition Government, is nearing completion on the Welsh site.
Boeing and Airbus parent EADS are competing for a near £30bn contract to supply the US Air Force with new airborne refuelling tankers. The EADS tanker is based on the Airbus A330, one of the planes that received aid challenged by the United States.
The EU is likely to appeal against the WTO ruling, delaying the point at which it takes force. Brussels says the Airbus findings are only part of the picture and it is premature for one side to claim victory.
The WTO is expected to produce an initial confidential report next month in a countersuit brought by the EU against the United States over support for Boeing.
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