British Airways (BA, London Heathrow) has received European Commission approval for the planned acquisition of bmi british midland (Nottingham East Midlands) from competitor Lufthansa (LH, Frankfurt International). It will integrate bmi's Heathrow mainline operations and be allowed to keep 28 of the 42 slot pairs bmi currently holds at Heathrow. The deal does not include bmi regional and bmibaby (Nottingham East Midlands) which will remain to be subsidiaries of Lufthansa for now although both are up for sale.