Millions of euros in Opel aid bound for Russia
- Source: Global Times
- [09:59 September 15 2009]
- Comments
Hundreds of millions of euros in German state aid planned for carmaker Opel is earmarked for operations in Russia, an Opel trustee with reservations about the project was quoted as saying in a newspaper interview Sunday.
"More than 600 million euros ($876 million) of the 4.5 billion euros ($6.6 billion) – in German aid – is supposedly to be used to modernize the Russian automotive industry according to the Magna plan," Dirk Pfeil told the Frankfurt Allgemeine Zeiting in an interview released.
"That means German expertise will soon be transferred to Russia and jobs will be cut here later."
US carmaker General Motors agreed Thursday to sell a 55 percent stake in its European arm Opel to Canadian automotive supplier Magna and Russia's Sberbank.
The Opel Trust – set up by Germany to oversee a 65 percent stake in Opel and keep it from being sucked into GM's brief bankruptcy proceedings – approved the sale when Pfeil abstained in a vote despite misgivings about the transaction.
Magna and its Russian partners had proposed cutting around 10,000 jobs in Europe in a drive to restore the company to profit from 2011. Half of Opel's 50,000 staff work in Germany. Final details are supposed to be worked out by the end of November.
State aid to Opel is a hot topic amid concerns that German jobs and plants may get preferential treatment over other countries in Europe like Britain and Belgium that also host GM factories.
