VB,
There are no official statements on Ryanair's website, although MOL obviously comments on all kinds of issues every time he faces the press.
With their recent moves towards more 'main' airports, I think they will be more likely to stay. There are at least separate low cost and airbridge enabled gates.
FR have previously pulled routes due to the German APD equivalent, currently €8. Faced with a large new airport on their doorstep, German politicians might would want to see this revised down, rather than up, but they will also have to placate the powerful green lobby - but they didn't stop FRA adding a new runway.
I think the demise of AB has been predicted quite a few times in recent years - surely any airline needs to be of a certain financial standing in order to be accepted into one of the alliance groups?
AB have 15 A330's in the fleet, and 15 787s due from 2014. I think that should be sufficient to launch new long haul routes, if they see profit potential? Obviously, long haul is higher risk, but AB are already in this arena, and they won't face competition from other European loco's.
I never said BER was the only place to offer an 'eastern' advantage - unlike the US E or W coasts which have strict cut-off points, BER will compete with various airports N,S,E and W. However, the population of BER, at 4.4m (metro) is notably larger than most other comparable airports, and disposable incomes are also higher than they are to the east. Therefore, there is a huge, wealthy market for o&d, which can then be supplemented by offering transfers.
Of course BA won't drop oneworld connections via HEL - my suggestion was simply that AB might offer some extra destinations to the east, and these could be offered as through connections with BA from LHR, and perhaps with additional ex-UK routes such as BHX.
It is quite common to be routed outbound LHR-ORD-SLC and then return SLC-DFW-LHR, so why not via BER when AB have full OW membership next year, assuming they are still with us
