France will "do everything to save" the Airbus A400M military transport plane project, the defence minister said Wednesday on the eve of a meeting of partner countries to discuss the programme's fate.
"This is a major programme for the European defence industry, it is the flagship programme that shows what we can jointly achieve and we will do everything to save this programme," Herve Morin told lawmakers.
The defence minister said he was hoping for a cost-sharing agreement before the end of January and ahead of a NATO defence ministers' meeting in Istanbul on February 4 and 5.
Airbus chief executive Tom Enders warned on Tuesday that the company might be forced to scrap the long-delayed programme if its European backers fail to put up more cash to cover cost overruns by the end of the month.
Developing the high-tech A400M transport planes has proved much more costly and time-consuming than anticipated when the project was agreed in 2003 by NATO members Germany, Spain, France, Britain, Turkey, Belgium and Luxembourg.
A total of 180 aircraft have been ordered for about 20 billion euros (29 billion dollars) but the project partners are being asked to plough in more to cover unexpected costs and some have voiced unease about the rising price.
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