A German regional labour court issued a temporary injunction against the pilot’s union Vereinigung Cockpit on Wednesday, calling time on a two-day strike that had grounded more than 1000 Lufthansa planes.
The court judge the strike as unlawful. It reached that decision because the union was trying to stop Lufthansa expanding its low cost Eurowings arm, which is not related to pilot wages, according to news agency dpa.
"We are surprised by the decision," said Markus Wahl, a spokesman for the VC union. "We will review the decision and then draw the consequences for our continuing labour battle."
The union ordered all pilots to return to work immediately.
According to a Lufthansa, German’s biggest airline, 140,000 travellers were affected and 1,000 flights were cancelled due to the strike on Wednesday.
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Pilots began halting long distance flights on Tuesday and extended it to medium and haul journey Wednesday.
It is the 13th strike within 18 month for the airline in a long running dispute between the pilots’ union and the German airline’s management.
The company said flights would be back to normal on Thursday.
