Airbus chief urges staff to vote in polls

[BERLIN] Alarmed by a surge of anti-EU populists, the chief executive of European aerospace firm Airbus Group has taken the unusual step of writing to the group's 144,000 employees to urge them to vote in the European Parliament elections.

"I didn't tell my colleagues what to vote, but I said 'Go and vote'," Tom Enders told Reuters in an interview, saying that he hoped that radical, anti-European parties would "get as few votes as possible". "I wanted to make them (Airbus staff) reflect on the context between European integration and the success of our company."

The European aerospace and defence conglomerate, rival to the US's Boeing Co in the global aviation market, was founded in 2000 with the backing of the French and German governments, which hold minority stakes in it. It incorporates the Airbus planemaker brand set up in 1970.