one often overlooked possible member could be Air Mauritius, although small and based on the middle of Indian Ocean, it nevertheless has connections to many African and Indian cities, and would be useful to cover another OW black spot. Given the historical ties between Mauritius and France it is at the moment aligned with AF, but with a little persuasion can be possibly made to switch to OW.

Many African cities ?

Currently MK flies to only 4 cities on the mainland JNB ( daily ) , CPT ( 2 x weekly ), DUR ( 1 x weekly )and NBO ( 1 x weekly ) . For OW JNB is already served by BA from LHR , QF from SYD , IB from MAD and CX from HKG . NBO and CPT are both served from LHR by BA . DUR along with CPT is also served from JNB several times daily by BA franchise carrier Comair ( who also compete with MK on the JNB-MRU route ) .

So far as I can see MK would add only four destinations to the OW map - TNR in Madagascar , St Denis and St Pierre in Reunion and Rodrigues in Mauritius . All nice to have , but hardly major destinations in their own right .

As for the 4 cities served in India ( MAA/BLR/DEL/BOM ) , between them they get a total of 6 flights per week last time I checked .

Sorry , it is an interesting suggestion , but I dont really see MK having much to offer OW .

Agreed, OW should continue adding quality members and in China Hainan Airlines has recently been awarded 4 stars by Skytrax. They've also been expanding their destinations and have large shares in a variety of airlines eg. Hong Kong Airlines, Hong Kong Express, etc.
Haven't they been sponsored by JAL to join OW?

I think HU's relationship with HX and UO is the main reason that prevents them from joining OW. CX would not be happy about that.

A way of getting from North Africa to South Africa apart from anything else. And another route in from Hong Kong.

When did MK start flying to North Africa ? There are no North African destinations on their website , and , having lived in Mauritius up until 3 months ago , I have never heard of MK North African flights .

Is OW really going to be interested in a carrier just because they fly to HKG 3 x per week ?

There is also the point that 2 of MKs most important routes ( MRU-LHR and MRU-JNB) are actually run in competition with BA services on the same routes .

Bad use of the term "North Africa", sorry. I meant that it at least removes NBO from the "cul-de-sac" list that can only be accessed through London and opens up a few more interesting ways of using 4 segments in Africa.

Canada's Westjet is "scrutinising" both Skyteam and Oneworld

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repor...rticle1521871/

Westjet's ties to AF/KL and potential codeshare arrangement with Delta may tip this one against OW.

I've never even heard of this company..

MU has started codesharing on most of the domestic Aussie routes and the latter will also be placing QF codes on 6-7 new Chinese domestic cities served by MU. I really hope this will eventually bring MU into OW...

MU is operating on behalf of AA in mainland China, so that might be a hint

On the other hand they have just signed a close co-operation deal with CI who have long been touted as a future Skyteam member

http://www.flightglobal.com/articles...operation.html

I think at the moment MU are still playing everyone off against each other , although I suspect that to maintain a 'balance' the PRC Government will eventually tell them to join OW so that the PRC will have a member in each of the three alliances .

I missed this from the OW press release this week.

Oneworld Eyeing JetBlue Links

Rumours about that MU is signing with Skyteam this Friday.
Link

Maybe AA will cancel their "partnership" with MU very soon?