Ryanair has settled a lawsuit out of court brought by Sweden’s ex-prime minister Goran Persson after it used his picture in an advertisement without his consent, his lawyer said today (17th December).

“They reached an agreement … to settle. The agreement is for two payments of €4,000 ($5,750), that is to say €8,000, to Mr. Persson and Mrs. (Laila) Freivalds,” the former foreign minister whose image was also used, their lawyer, Lennart Kanter, said. The court case would have been held on Tuesday.

The Ryanair advertisement was published in the Swedish press in February 2006.
In a reference to a crisis of confidence that shook the Swedish government following the 2004 Asian tsunami disaster, and which continued throughout 2005, the Irish carrier published a photograph of Persson and Freivalds under the caption “Time to flee the country?”.

With €4,000 per person, the two political figures received half of what they had sought.
It is good to hear that both Persson and Freivalds will donate the money to undisclosed charities,
At €8,000, the cost to Ryanair may be considered “low-cost” considering the PR value of the all the extra attention they recieved.

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