Luis Gallego IATA Chair: Luis Gallego Named IATA Chair as LATAM Airlines Group to Host AGM in Rio 2026, ET TravelWorld
Advt
Advt
By ,
ETTravelWorld
Join the community of 2M+ industry professionals Subscribe to our newsletter to get latest insights & analysis.
Download ETTravelWorld App Get Realtime updates
Save your favourite articles
Scan to download App
Following a landmark gathering in New Delhi for its 81st Annual General Meeting (AGM), the International Air Transport Association (IATA) has confirmed a dual leadership and geographical shift: Luis Gallego, CEO of International Airlines Group (IAG), has been named Chair of the IATA Board, while LATAM Airlines Group will host the 82nd AGM in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in June 2026.The baton was passed to Gallego at the conclusion of the AGM in New Delhi on 2 June 2025. Gallego, who becomes the 83rd Chair of the IATA Board, brings nearly three decades of experience across Europe's aviation sector. His leadership tenure at Iberia, Iberia Express, Vueling, and Clickair helped steer these carriers toward greater efficiency and service excellence. Gallego's current position at the helm of IAG since 2020 has positioned him at the forefront of European aviation strategy.'I am honoured to be taking up the position of Chair of the IATA Board,' said Gallego. 'Our industry faces complex challenges—from environmental sustainability to global infrastructure—but it also has extraordinary potential driven by its people. I look forward to steering IATA's efforts in creating a strong, innovative and resilient global airline industry.'IATA Director General Willie Walsh welcomed Gallego's appointment, stating, 'Luis has a long and deep involvement with the complex issues which are top priorities for our Association—facilitating net zero carbon emissions by 2050, achieving a smart approach to regulation and ensuring the right capacity and cost structure.'Looking ahead, LATAM Airlines Group will host the next AGM in Rio, marking the association's return to South America for the first time since 1999. 'We are excited to accept LATAM's offer to host IATA's 82nd AGM,' Walsh added. 'Meeting in the largest aviation market in South America highlights the region's rising strategic role in global connectivity.'For LATAM, the event presents an opportunity to showcase both the growth of its own operations and the evolving aviation landscape in Brazil. 'LATAM is proud to host the IATA AGM in Brazil in 2026, the main market for our airline group connecting South America to the world,' said Roberto Alvo, CEO of LATAM Airlines Group. 'Rio de Janeiro, one of the most spectacular cities globally, will ensure a memorable experience for attendees.'With a network spanning 153 destinations in 27 countries and a record 82 million passengers transported in 2024, LATAM has also made significant strides in sustainability and fleet modernisation. The airline's legacy is rooted in a continent whose aviation history traces back to pioneers like Alberto Santos-Dumont. Brazil has previously hosted IATA AGMs in 1947 and 1999, both of which highlighted the country's centrality in Latin American aviation.With Gallego taking on IATA's top board role and LATAM preparing to welcome aviation leaders to Rio, the next chapter for the airline industry promises a sharper focus on sustainability, regional inclusion, and collaborative leadership.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Hindustan Times
28 minutes ago
- Hindustan Times
NATO wrestles over how to handle Ukraine at Trump summit
How to have Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky at NATO's Hague summit and avoid a bust-up with US President Donald Trump? What to say on Kyiv's desire to join their alliance? With NATO appearing on track to seal a deal on ramping up defence spending, another thorny issue now threatens to overshadow the gathering in three weeks: what to do about Ukraine? When they met in Washington a year ago, NATO's leaders feted Zelensky, pledged more military hardware and vowed Kyiv was on an "irreversible path" for membership in their alliance. That was before Trump's return to the White House ripped up Washington's support for Ukraine and upended the West's approach to Russia's three-year war. Since he regained the US presidency, Trump had a dramatic Oval Office falling out with Zelensky, opened the door to warmer ties with Moscow and forced both sides to the negotiating table. Kyiv's European backers have pushed to invite Zelensky to the June 24-25 meeting in the Netherlands to show NATO still stands strongly behind Ukraine. But the United States has been reluctant even to have Zelensky there and the reality is Trump has already blown a huge hole in Western backing for Kyiv. The Ukrainian leader said this week he'd received an invite from NATO chief Mark Rutte for Kyiv to be there in some form. "We can confirm that Ukraine will be with us in The Hague," a NATO official told AFP. Diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Zelensky could come for a dinner hosted by the Dutch king for NATO leaders, but that there likely wouldn't be formal talks between Ukraine and the alliance. "It will be a PR disaster if he's not there," a European diplomat said, speaking as others on condition of anonymity. How Zelensky may be received in The Hague looks set to depend heavily on the progress, if any, of fraught talks with Russia over the next few weeks. So far two rounds of meetings between the warring sides in Istanbul have produced few results. Trump appears to be getting increasingly annoyed with Russian President Vladimir Putin for dragging his feet on a ceasefire. But the US leader still hasn't responded with sanctions against Moscow and has equally expressed his displeasure with Zelensky's outspokenness. Rutte has insisted that Ukraine remains a "priority" issue at the summit. Diplomats, however, say that the overwhelming focus is on striking an agreement on spending that satisfies Trump's demands to spend five percent of GDP on defence and keeps the United States on board at NATO. Multiple officials say the alliance looks set to reach a compromise put forward by Rutte of 3.5 percent of GDP on core defence, and 1.5 percent on broader spending such as infrastructure. "Defence spending is the most important part and no one wants to jeopardise that," a second diplomat said. One area where there doesn't seem much uncertainty is that NATO will steer clear of its previous strong statements that Ukraine is on course to join the alliance. Trump has repeatedly poured cold water on Ukraine's ambition to become a member and even blamed Kyiv's bid to join for provoking Russia's war. NATO is aiming to keep a final declaration from the summit short and avoid mention of Ukraine's possible membership to not open up any fissures. "There will be nothing on that," said a third diplomat, at NATO. "My expectation is we will be absolutely silent." There also looks set to be no joint statement on military support from the alliance's 32 countries as Trump has hit the brakes on assistance. In a sign of how far the US has moved, officials said US defence secretary Pete Hegseth won't attend a meeting of NATO backers in Brussels on Wednesday. He will however jet in for a meeting of NATO defence ministers on Thursday. del/ec/giv
The Hindu
an hour ago
- The Hindu
Qwant asks French watchdog to take interim action against Microsoft
Qwant has asked France's antitrust regulator to take action against Microsoft for allegedly driving down the quality of the French search engine's results via Microsoft's Bing platform, people with direct knowledge of the matter said. Qwant, which has historically relied on Microsoft's Bing platform, wants the regulator to take interim action against the U.S. tech giant while investigating its complaint, the sources said. The French regulator has sought feedback from other search engines and will likely decide by September whether to take interim action and also whether to open a formal investigation into Microsoft, one of the people said. Competition enforcers only take interim action if there is evidence that a company abuses its market power and has caused serious and immediate harm to the complainant. The French competition enforcer and Qwant declined to comment. "This complaint lacks merit. We are fully cooperating with the Autorite's investigation," a Microsoft spokesperson said, referring to the French watchdog. Smaller European search engines typically rely on their bigger rivals' back-end technology to deliver search and news results. Microsoft is a major player in the search-engine syndication sector but its smaller rivals fear the company will discontinue the service to their detriment. Companies risk fines of as much as 10% of their global annual turnover for breaching French antitrust rules.
Time of India
an hour ago
- Time of India
Expanding missile threats and airspace closures are straining airlines
Live Events WORST-CASE SCENARIO TOUGH CHOICES (You can now subscribe to our (You can now subscribe to our Economic Times WhatsApp channel Proliferating conflict zones are an increasing burden on airline operations and profitability, executives say, as carriers grapple with missiles and drones, airspace closures, location spoofing and the shoot-down of another passenger are racking up costs and losing market share from cancelled flights and expensive re-routings, often at short notice. The aviation industry, which prides itself on its safety performance, is investing more in data and security planning."Flight planning in this kind of environment is extremely difficult ... The airline industry thrives on predictability, and the absence of this will always drive greater cost," said Guy Murray, who leads aviation security at European carrier TUI increasing airspace closures around Russia and Ukraine, throughout the Middle East, between India and Pakistan and in parts of Africa, airlines are left with fewer route options."Compared to five years ago, more than half of the countries being overflown on a typical Europe-Asia flight would now need to be carefully reviewed before each flight," said Mark Zee, founder of OPSGROUP, a membership-based organisation that shares flight risk Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the Middle East since October 2023 led to commercial aviation sharing the skies with short-notice barrages of drones and missiles across major flight paths - some of which were reportedly close enough to be seen by pilots and airports, including in Moscow, are now regularly shut down for brief periods due to drone activity, while interference with navigation systems, known as GPS spoofing or jamming, is surging around political fault lines hostilities broke out between India and Pakistan last month, the neighbours blocked each other's aircraft from their respective airspace."Airspace should not be used as a retaliatory tool, but it is," Nick Careen, International Air Transport Association (IATA) senior vice president for operations, safety and security, told reporters at the airline body's annual meeting in New Delhi on Porqueras, chief operating officer at Indian carrier IndiGo, said the recent diversions were undoing efforts to reduce emissions and increase airline aside, civil aviation's worst-case scenario is a plane being hit, accidentally or intentionally, by December, an Azerbaijan Airlines flight crashed in Kazakhstan, killing 38 people. The plane was accidentally shot down by Russian air defences, according to Azerbaijan's president and Reuters October, a cargo plane was shot down in Sudan, killing five commercial aircraft have been shot down, with three near-misses since 2001, according to aviation risk consultancy Osprey Flight need to share information more effectively to keep civil aviation secure as conflict zones proliferate, IATA Director General Willie Walsh said this statistics used by the commercial aviation industry show a steady decline in accidents over the past two decades, but these do not include security-related incidents such as being hit by said in February that accidents and incidents related to conflict zones were a top concern for aviation safety requiring urgent global airline decides where to travel based on a patchwork of government notices, security advisers, and information-sharing between carriers and states, leading to divergent closure of Russian airspace to most Western carriers since the outbreak of war in Ukraine in 2022 put them at a cost disadvantage compared to airlines from places like China, India and the Middle East that continue to take shorter northern routes that need less fuel and fewer risk calculations mean Singapore Airlines' flight SQ326 from Singapore to Amsterdam has used three different routes into Europe in just over a year, Flightradar24 tracking data reciprocal missile and drone attacks broke out between Iran and Israel in April 2024, it started crossing previously avoided Afghanistan instead of month, its route shifted again to avoid Pakistan's airspace as conflict escalated between India and Pakistan. Flight SQ326 now reaches Europe via the Persian Gulf and Iraq. Singapore Airlines did not respond immediately to a request for and flight attendants are also worried about how the patchwork of shifting risk might impact their safety."IATA says airlines should decide if it's safe to fly over conflict zones, not regulators. But history shows commercial pressures can cloud those decisions," said Paul Reuter, vice president of the European Cockpit Association, which represents crew typically have the right to refuse a trip due to concerns about airspace, whether over weather or conflict zones, IATA security head Careen said."Most airlines, in fact, I would say the vast majority of them, do not want crew on an aircraft if they don't feel comfortable flying," he said.
