Lufthansa submits new offer to pilots ahead of strike deadline

Lufthansa has submitted a new offer to the pilots of core brand Lufthansa Airlines and the cargo subsidiary Lufthansa Cargo in an ongoing wage dispute, a spokesperson for the German flagship carrier said on Friday. With the offer, wage negotiations have begun in earnest, said a spokesperson from the pilots union Vereinigung Cockpit (VC). Exploratory talks had been dragging on for some time, so the VC had asked for a concrete offer at the beginning of June. The offer comes days before a truce period on strikes runs out on June 30, threatening to disrupt the busy summer season if no agreement is found for the more than 5,000 cockpit employees. According to a report in the German daily Handelsblatt on Friday, combined with wage increases that were already paid last September, the revised offer amounts to a salary increase of 18.5%, which would be paid over several years until 2025. In a letter seen by Reuters on Friday, the collective bargaining committee said essential elements from the list of demands were still missing from the offer in a first assessment.<br/>