(DUBLIN) - Irish budget airline Ryanair said on Thursday that it had submitted a formal complaint to the EU Commission regarding "the latest unlawful bailout" of the Italian carrier Alitalia.

"This is the latest and perhaps most blatant example of the Italian government doing whatever it takes to protect their failed airline," Ryanair's director of legal and regulatory affairs, Jim Callaghan, said in a statement.

"It is also the second time that they have used the trick of simply shifting debt out of the airline and into a subsidiary in order to keep the airline afloat."

Under the plan to rescue Alitalia from bankruptcy, a new streamlined airline was set to take off on November 1 with the support of a foreign carrier.

Air France-KLM, which holds a two percent stake in Alitalia, indicated that it was considering raising that to between 10 and 20 percent, while German rival Lufthansa reportedly wants as much as 49 percent.

Callaghan added on Thursday: "Despite the blatant nature of the Italian government's breaches of the EU state aid rules, we have no doubt that the EU Commission will again rubber stamp this unlawful bailout."

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