Lufthansa says Germanwings flight crash leaves permanent scars

The Germanwings flight crash has left permanent scars on its parent company Lufthansa, the company's chief executive said on Wednesday.

He made the remarks while addressing some 1,500 shareholders at its general shareholders' meeting in the northern port city of Hamburg. "The tragedy has changed us and the scars it has left on our company will remain forever," said Carsten Spohr.

The annual meeting started with a minute's silence to mourn the dead. Spohr said that the company would support the families of the dead.

People who attended the meeting were seen signing their names on a condolence book at the company. The Lufthansa family is mourning, chairman of the supervisory board Wolfgang Mayrhuber said at the meeting.

In a press release, Lufthansa said the shareholders agreed all the nine agenda points at the shareholders' meeting with a large majority.

With regard to the business of the company, the name of Germanwings disappeared. Instead, the company unveiled that it would set up a "pan-European secondary brand, Eurowings", which will develop into number three on the European low-cost market with over 100 aircraft.

The Germanwings flight 4U9525 crashed in southern French Alps when it was flying back to Duesseldorf from Spain's Barcelona on March 24.

Initial investigations found that the co-pilot of the flight was believed to deliberately lowered the height of the flight before he crashed it, killing all the 150 people including 144 passengers on board the flight.

According to the annual report of Lufthansa, the net profit of the company dropped to 55 million euros in 2014 from 313 million in 2013.

Lufthansa needs financial stability with sound profitability. "Our mission is to be the number one choice of our customers, shareholders and staff, and further develop our market position," Spohr told shareholders. Endit