Lufthansa cancels flights in and out of Paris

All flights of German airline Lufthansa into and out of Paris's Charles De Gaulle airport were cancelled on Thursday morning as employees called in sick, apparently in protest at planned job losses.

German Lufthansa employees protest at the job-loss plan in September Reuters/Kai Pfaffenbach

"Nobody's here, all the employees are ill," a Paris airports spokesperson told the AFP news agency.

All Lufthansa flights - 11 arrivals and 11 departures - were cancelled.

Trade union representatives said that only 11 Lufthansa employees turned up for work on Thursday and that managers were taking Christmas holidays.

Workers are "tired, depressed and working at 20 per cent below capacity due to illness", a union statement said.

A company high-up was expected to arrive at the airport from its headquarters in Frankfort at 1.00pm.

A 2012 redundancy plan proposed to axe 3,500 jobs worldwide, 199 of them in France, which would mean reducing personnel by 75 per cent, according to unions, who claim that there have been no meaningful negotiations on the proposal, which is due to come into force in February.