Price fixing investigation includes Northwest Airlines

Price fixing investigation includes Northwest Airlines    Northwest Airlines was publicly identified for the first time as a target of federal prosecutors into a wide-scale probe of price fixing in the air cargo industry, according to the Associated Press.
   U.S. and European Union officials early last year began an investigation into charges that several cargo airlines colluded to fix prices on freight shipments.
   Federal subpoenas or requests for information previously went out to Lufthansa, British Airways, Air France-KLM, Scandinavian Airlines System, Japan Airlines, AMR Corp.'s American Airlines, and United Airlines, a division of UAL Corp.
   Lufthansa said it has agreed to pay $85 million to settle class-action lawsuits filed in the United States over alleged price fixing by its cargo division. Some airlines are not believed to have had an extensive role in the price fixing, but were contacted to supply information for the investigation.
   Northwest, the largest cargo operator among U.S. passenger airlines, confirmed to AP that it received a subpoena last year in the investigation after the news agency inquired about a large attorney bill submitted in its bankruptcy case related to the Justice Department price fixing case.