PARIS, Oct. 5 (UPI) -- Air France-KLM said it had no plans to cut employees or reduce assets at Italian airline Alitalia in order to raise fresh capital.
Air France-KLM owns 25 percent of Alitalia and denied it had plans to increase that share in order to to cut jobs at Alitalia, which has been struggling to make a profit, Italy's ANSA news agency reported Saturday.
"We are not aware of any French plan," said Alitalia board member Maurizio Traglio.
"The conditions are not there," he said.
The Rome newspaper Il Messaggero said an anonymous tipster had said the French airline had plans to cut the Alitalia fleet in half, end Alitalia runway handling services in Rome and move other services from Rome to the Charles De Gaulle airport in Paris.
Air France-KLM said last week it would consider a merger with Alitalia if the airline reached certain financial goals.
On Friday, however, Air France-KLM Chief Financial Officer Philippe Calavia said that reports of a job cutting takeover were "falsehoods."
