EU top court rejects Air France, others' fight against EU cargo cartel fine

BRUSSELS, Feb 26 (Reuters) - Europe's top court on Thursday rejected Air France KLM AIRF.PA, British Airways and almost all of their peers in their fight against fines totalling 776 million euros levied by EU antitrust regulators nine years ago for taking part in an air cargo cartel.

"The Court of Justice rejects almost all of the arguments put forward by the airlines. Only the appeal brought by SAS Cargo Group is upheld in part, on the grounds of errors made by the General Court in calculating the amount of the fine imposed on that airline", the Luxembourg-based court said in a statement.

The European Commission, which acts as the EU competition enforcer, in 2017 reissued the fines to 11 airlines for taking part in the cartel, after a lower tribunal scrapped its first total fine of 799 million euros imposed in 2010 due to a procedural error.

The cases are C-367/22 P Air Canada v Commission, C-369/22 P Air France v Commission, C-370/22 P Air France-KLM v Commission, C-375/22 P LATAM Airlines Group and Lan Cargo v Commission, C-378/22 P British Airways v Commission, C-379/22 P Singapore Airlines and Singapore Airlines Cargo v Commission, C-380/22 P Deutsche Lufthansa and Others v Commission, C-381/22 P Japan Airlines v Commission, C-382/22 P Cathay Pacific Airways v Commission, C-385/22 P Koninklijke Luchtvaart Maatschappij v Commission, C-386/22 P Martinair Holland v Commission, C-401/22 P Cargolux Airlines v Commission and C-403/22 P SAS Cargo Group and Others v Commission.