Strikes Hit France, Austria, Germany and Italy

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Wednesday, June 04, 2003

Strikes Hit France, Austria, Germany and Italy

Travelers were stranded and children were out of school across Europe Tuesday as strikes caused mayhem in France and Austria and lesser disruptions in Germany and Italy.

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Travelers were stranded and children were out of school across Europe Tuesday as strikes caused mayhem in France and Austria and lesser disruptions in Germany and Italy.

The French strikes by public sector workers, the second nationwide stoppages in three weeks over pension reforms, hobbled train services, grounded most international flights and closed schools in a new blow to Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin's center-right government.

In Austria, transport and postal workers staged the biggest walkout since World War II, also over pensions, while steel plants and engineering firms in eastern Germany were hit for a second day by walkouts over working hours.

Italian airline Alitalia had to cancel 200 flights because of a strike by cabin staff over job cuts.

The French stoppages recall 1995 strikes that brought down the last right-wing government for trying to touch pensions.

French unions are up in arms over plans to make workers pay into the state pension system for 40 years, while Austrian workers are fighting plans to cut pensions by around 11 percent.

Authorities in both countries are fighting to stave off a financial crunch in the pensions systems as populations age.

Thirteen years after reunification, striking workers in Germany's former communist east are fighting for the same working hours as their western colleagues, but the authorities say the economy cannot support such a change.

A 24-hour walkout by air traffic controllers cut 80 percent of flights to and from France, although skeleton train and bus services were running. Electricity output fell by five percent and few national newspapers were printed.

German workers wearing red strike vests rallied at the factory gates of a Volkswagen plant in Mosel and at other engineering firms in the region. They want a reduction in workers' weekly working hours to 35 from 38 currently to bring them into line with western Germany.

In Austria, buses, trains, subways and streetcars stopped operating shortly after midnight for about 24 hours.

Groups of striking airport workers blocked the entrance road to Vienna International Airport, making it difficult for travelers to reach their terminals, but airport officials said air traffic in and out of Vienna was unhindered.

Source: Agencies

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