Attempts by several airlines to overturn fines in the two-decade legal battle over air cargo cartel participation have failed, after European judges rejected appeals.
The case dates back to December 2005 when Lufthansa Group and Swiss International Air Lines sought immunity after alleging that multiple airlines were maintaining extensive anticompetitive contact regarding the pricing of air freight – specifically surcharges for fuel and security.
Several carriers were fined a total of some €790 million ($916 million) by the European Commission in 2010 but this decision was followed by long-running legal wrangles to reduce or cancel the penalties.
The overall fine was subsequently revised to €776 million in 2017.
Further legal arguments led to a European General Court ruling in 2022 which upheld fines against several operators – including Air France-KLM Group carriers, Cargolux, and Singapore Airlines – while lowering those for a number of other airlines.
Fines were reduced for Air Canada, Japan Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and LATAM Airlines, while adjustments to SAS’s penalty left its fine largely unchanged.
These 2022 decisions also became the subject of appeals, but a new ruling in February 2026 by the Court of Justice of the EU – comprising 13 judgements – completely rejects nearly all of the airlines’ appeal arguments.
Only SAS came away with a slightly reduction, from €70 million to about €63 million, based on General Court errors in calculating the fines for each of the Scandinavian operator’s divisions.
The Court of Justice says it rejected the airlines’ arguments challenging the Commission’s jurisdiction to penalise the cartel over air freight services from third countries to the EU.
It states that the General Court “did not err” in confirming the jurisdiction.
The Court of Justice also dismissed a challenge to the airlines’ behaviour having been characterised as a “single and continuous infringement”.
It states that the cartel had been active for more than six years, from December 1999 to February 2006, and the absence of direct evidence of participation during certain specific periods in that timeframe “does not preclude” the airlines’ participation as being established for those period.
Airlines in the case have also raised a plea based on the Commission’s own rules on limitation periods to impose penalties in competition issues.
