Yesterday British Airways indicated that the plans of the Russian air company S7 Airlines to join the Oneworld Alliance that were announced in summer 2007 might come true within the nearest 1.5-2 years. First of all it would be in behalf of the British air company which could get access to the Russian domestic market via S7 joining the alliance. British Airways finds it non-beneficial to develop flights to Britain from Russian regions on its own.
      
      “We are interested in cooperation with the air company that has modern western aircraft and that can guarantee safety of its flights and would be ready to provide us with convenient connection flights to Domodedovo Airport”, British Airways regional manager Andrew Hammans said yesterday. He also added: “I will not give the name of this air company but if exclude all companies that do not match the description you can understand easily what company I am talking about”.
      
      The market participants are sure that it is all about S7, which in summer 2008 announced its negotiations with Oneworld over joining the alliance. Apart from British Airways the alliance includes American Airlines, Cathay Pacific Airways, Finnair, Iberia, LAN Airlines, JAL, Royal Jordanian, Malåv Hungarian Airlines, LAN Argentina è LAN Ecuador.
      
      “At the moment the negotiations over cooperation with British Airways are at consulting stage. Along with that we have been holding negotiations with the other alliance members”, deputy PR director of S7 Igor Volkov comments.
      
      Source: www.rbcdaily.ru