Clyde Caruana will next week fly to Brussels to make Malta’s case after the European Commission asked for more information about the government's request for permission to pump €290 million into its national airline.

Asked for an update on Malta’s state aid plan, the Finance Minister told Times of Malta on Thursday there had been at least another three technical meetings since his last meeting in Brussels on April 23.

The European Commission was not relying solely on the hefty document sent by the Maltese government backing the request, but was asking for more information, he added.

“Next week I will fly to Brussels to follow up these discussions and provide my input,” he said.

He did not say whether Air Malta will face further shedding of staff.

The airline has been suffering losses that were made exponentially worse when the COVID-19 pandemic brought most air travel to a halt last year. 

In February, Caruana said he was working on “an honest and credible” plan to allow the country to help the national airline as it was making losses of over €170,000 daily just to operate its aircraft. 

On Thursday, the European Commission said it had approved €12.8m of Italian state aid for Alitalia to compensate the airline for losses suffered during the coronavirus pandemic for the month of January.

The new direct grant takes to more than €310 million euros the total of state aid approved by the EU in favour of Alitalia for damages caused by the pandemic from March to December 2020.