London - After luggage check-in charges and speedy boarding fees, leading budget airline Ryanair is considering levies for the use of cabin loos to meet costs, chief executive Michael O'Leary said Friday.

The Irish entrepreneur said passengers might in future have to pay a pound (1.42 dollars) to spend a penny on his fleet. He did not reveal if and how the charge could possibly also be made in euros, given the airline's many European destinations.

Development fee to be levied at Kolkata, Chennai, Goa, Thiruvananthapuram and Ahmedabad airports run by AAI

Get ready to pay a fee to use even those airports which are under the aegis of Airport Authority of India (AAI).

Civil aviation minister Praful Patel said on Thursday a development fee will be levied at Kolkata, Chennai, Goa, Thiruvananthapuram and Ahmedabad airports. Till now, such a fee had been levied at airports developed through the public-private partnership model — Bangalore, Hyderabad and Delhi — but the ministry was hesitant in charging fliers for development of AAI-owned airports. AAI is a state-run company tasked with development and maintenance of civil airports.

Kuala Lumpur  - International demand for air freight recorded a dip of 23.6 per cent in January because of a lull in world trade amid the global economic downturn, the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines said Friday.

The drop in freight ton kilometres was seen from the same month a year ago as total cargo loads registered a mere 56.6 per cent of capacity, a dip of more than 7 percentage points, the association said in a statement.

Asia-Pacific airlines also suffered a drop in passenger volume in January of 7.8 per cent from last year to stand at 11.4 million passengers.

Geneva  - January was the fifth consecutive month of contraction in international air passenger demand and was the eighth straight month of contraction for freight traffic, the International Air Transport Association said Thursday.

"Every region's carriers are reporting big drops in cargo," Giovanni Bisignani, the IATA chief, said in a statement.

Furthermore, "aside from the Middle East carriers, passenger demand is falling in all regions."

Tata Consultancy Services would continue to provide IT services to Singapore Airlines for another three years, providing all basic application solutions to the airlines for its efficient working. The airline chose the Indian IT firm in a formal vendor selection process under existing terms and conditions.

German air carrier Lufthansa ended up paying Rs 10,000 to a city-based businessman who was refused non-vegetarian food on a Frankfurt-bound flight on October 23, 2007.