Deutsche Post World Net CEO Frank Appel has defended the need for DHL’s cutbacks at its US hub atWilmington, Ohio, in a letter to US presidential candidate John McCain following the latter’s
criticism of the plans.Appel stressed that there was no alternative to the “drastic measures” due to the heavylosses of DHL Express in the USA and reiterated his previous comments that the planned UPS airliftdeal would not impact on competition between the two companies, German newspapers reported.
The DPWN chief emphasised that the group was working on measures to support the affectedregion and that it had set aside $2 billion for restructuring costs, including financial assistancefor the Wilmington area. Appel said he was prepared to travel to the USA to discuss the assistancemeasures “at an appropriate time”.
A company spokeswoman later clarified reports of an additional three-digit million euro sumin assistance payments by saying this figure was already included in the overall restructuringcosts figure and there were no current plans for any further payments.
Republican candidate McCain had previously criticised the planned closure of DHL’s US air hubat Wilmington with some 8,000 expected job losses and called for official investigations into anypotential anti-trust issues of the DHL-UPS deal. Democrat candidate Barack Obama had also madesimilar comments.
