The article was due to be published as France and Germany, the main forces within EADS, seek to defend their respective roles inside the new company.

Germany, which presented its demands on Friday, has been pushing for equality with France, which has a 15 percent stake and special rights through a shareholder pact.

However, those rights are set to disappear if the merger goes ahead and would be replaced by a special share whose exact properties have yet to be publicly defined.

Pressure on the governments involved is rising amid signs that the pact could unravel quickly in the absence of a deal, leaving France with a stake but no right to be heard on strategy and no voice for Germany.

King and Enders vowed that the new company would have “governance structures which would enable it to operate in a normal commercial manner and which confers the same rights on all shareholders, large and small.”

German magazine Der Spiegel on Sunday cited high-level civil servants as saying that France and Germany had agreed to each hold a 9 percent diluted stake in the merged entity, equivalent to a 15 percent undiluted stake in EADS.

The Franco-German agreement would form the basis for their negotiations with the British government in talks this week, the magazine added.

A spokesman for German Economy Minister Philipp Roesler declined to confirm or deny the report.

“The talks are continuing and the relevant questions are still being examined,” the spokesman said.