France's unions end strikes
Source: Agencies |
October 30, 2010, Saturday
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THE French President Nicolas Sarkozy looked ever surer of victory for his flagship pension reform yesterday as more oil sector workers ended strikes and enthusiasm seemed to be waning for further protest marches.
Protesters have staged mass demonstrations across France in recent weeks and strikers have shut down refineries, but they failed to stop parliament from enacting the reforms, which raise the minimum retirement age for state pensions to 62 from 60.
Workers at a northern oil terminal which serves a third of France's refineries, as well as at Total's Gonfreville plant and at the Ineos Lavera plant voted yesterday to end strikes that have squeezed petrol supplies this month.
Having passed parliament, the pension bill now awaits only a Constitutional Court signature to become law.
Unions are not dropping their opposition to the increase in retirement age, however, and a clause in the bill opens the possibility of a review in 2013, meaning the issue could come back to haunt Sarkozy in the 2012 presidential campaign.
"The pension problem does not end with the reform being voted. It's moreover written in the text that the system will be reviewed again in 2013," CFDT union head Francois Chereque said in an interview with Le Parisien yesterday.
Aslo yesterday, Sarkozy said France stands by its law banning burqa-like Muslim veils despite a threatening new message from al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden.
In a recently released audio tape, bin Laden threatens to kill French citizens in revenge for France's law to ban Muslim veils that cover the face, and because France has troops in Afghanistan.
Sarkozy confirmed that France believes the tape is authentic and said the country would not back down from the new rule.
"Obviously, France doesn't let anyone dictate its policies, and certainly not terrorists," Sarkozy said at a summit in Brussels.
Protesters have staged mass demonstrations across France in recent weeks and strikers have shut down refineries, but they failed to stop parliament from enacting the reforms, which raise the minimum retirement age for state pensions to 62 from 60.
Workers at a northern oil terminal which serves a third of France's refineries, as well as at Total's Gonfreville plant and at the Ineos Lavera plant voted yesterday to end strikes that have squeezed petrol supplies this month.
Having passed parliament, the pension bill now awaits only a Constitutional Court signature to become law.
Unions are not dropping their opposition to the increase in retirement age, however, and a clause in the bill opens the possibility of a review in 2013, meaning the issue could come back to haunt Sarkozy in the 2012 presidential campaign.
"The pension problem does not end with the reform being voted. It's moreover written in the text that the system will be reviewed again in 2013," CFDT union head Francois Chereque said in an interview with Le Parisien yesterday.
Aslo yesterday, Sarkozy said France stands by its law banning burqa-like Muslim veils despite a threatening new message from al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden.
In a recently released audio tape, bin Laden threatens to kill French citizens in revenge for France's law to ban Muslim veils that cover the face, and because France has troops in Afghanistan.
Sarkozy confirmed that France believes the tape is authentic and said the country would not back down from the new rule.
"Obviously, France doesn't let anyone dictate its policies, and certainly not terrorists," Sarkozy said at a summit in Brussels.
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