Ryanair cancels 300 flights due to strike by French air traffic controllers. The decision should affect communications with Portugal.

Budget airline Ryanair has canceled 300 flights due to a strike by French air traffic controllers and the decision is expected to affect flights to Portugal, he said in a statement this Wednesday.

Thus, the group “announced the cancellation of more than 300 flights due to the strike of French air traffic controllers”, which will take place this Thursday.

“This situation is due to the fact that France did not protect ‘flights passing through its airspace’ during national airstrikes,” he said.

According to Ryanair, despite a strike by French air traffic controllers, “the majority of affected passengers are not flying to or from France, but are flying over French airspace en route to their destination (e.g. UK, Greece, Spain, Italy)”, ensuring that “French law unfairly protects domestic flights.”

“Ryanair once again calls on European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to take urgent action to protect ‘these flights’, something she has not done for the last five years.”

Ryanair executive president Michael O’Leary was quoted in the same note as saying that “French air traffic controllers have the right to strike, that’s their right, but French flights should be cancelled, not flights originating from France.” Italy, or flights from Germany to Spain or from Scandinavia to Portugal.”

“The European Commission, under the leadership of Ursula von der Leyen, has taken no action for five years to protect overflights and the single air transport market,” he criticized, calling for measures to address the problem “that would eliminate more than 90% of these flight cancellations.”

The company is asking that flights passing through French airspace during the strikes be protected and that air traffic controllers from other European countries be able to control these connections. It also calls for compulsory arbitration before strikes in France.