Qatar Airways has taken the unusual step of publicly criticising Qantas for slashing its international flights by half, which it claims has "more than doubled the price" of fares.
Qantas shareholders were the beneficiaries of that strategy, according to Qatar Airways chief executive Akbar Al Baker, while Aussie passengers were having to dig deep.
Qatar Airways want the federal government to double the 28 weekly flights it is currently allowed to make into Australian airports, a number it claims is unfairly low compared to other major airlines, some who it says have been awarded up to 150 flights a week.
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A Qatar Airways spokesperson told 9news.com.au the carrier should be recognised for flying home tens of thousands of vulnerable Australians during the COVID-19 pandemic, while Qantas had grounded its fleet.
Qantas is reportedly against Qatar being given more flights into Australia.
Speaking recently on Sky News, Baker said Australians would have another "alternative" if Qatar was handed additional flights.
"The largest operator in Australia (Qantas) has cut its flights to 50 per cent of pre-COVID level, more than doubled the price of the fares to the Australian people in the benefit of the shareholders," he said.
Baker said Qantas had got "billions of dollars of state aid" during the coronavirus pandemic and should therefore be able to offer more flights.
But aviation analyst Neil Hansford claimed Qatar Airways' criticism of the national carrier could be a ploy to steer attention away from five Australian women who are suing the airline after they were allegedly strip-searched at gunpoint at Doha Airport.
Hansford acknowledged Qatar had "provided a lot of lift" for Australia while international borders were closed, but he accused the Middle Eastern carrier of being "opportunist" and trying to "eat everybody else's lunch".
"Qatar Airways is totally owned by the government of Qatar, which is one of the largest natural gas producers in the world," Hansford said.
"So it wasn't as if they had the pressure of shareholders (during the pandemic).
"They will do what's good for Qatar, and they will take every opportunity to provide more service."
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Hansford questioned the timing and public nature of Baker's comments.
"It's too coincidental that at a time when there's (legal) action against Qatar Airways … coming from Australian passengers that this current bun fight has erupted," Hansford claimed.
In 2020, 13 Australian women were among a group of female passengers allegedly removed from planes at gunpoint in Doha, and some allegedly intimately examined without explanation or their consent.
Qatari authorities had been searching for the mother of a newborn baby found abandoned in a plastic bag in the departures lounge at Doha's Hamad airport.
The legal action against Qatar Airways, and the state-run aviation authority, was lodged in the NSW supreme court last month.
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A Qatar Airways spokesperson said the airline was pushing for more weekly flights into Australia because of an "imbalance" in flight market share.
Between March and June in 2020, Qatar Airways said it repatriated almost 32,000 Aussies and had flown 84,000 foreign citizens out of Australia.
"Qatar Airways continued to operate despite the extremely restricted capacity granted to the airline compared to our competitors who despite having much more capacity entitlements to offer to Australian consumers, decided to cease their operations to Australia," the spokesperson said.
Qantas has a partnership with Emirates, the carrier for Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
Qatar Airways and Emirates are commercial rivals, while diplomatic relations between Qatar and the UAE have been frosty in recent years.
When contacted by 9news.com.au, Qantas did not respond.
