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Strike hits all French oil refineries as police break up Marseille picket Strike hits French oil refineries as police break up Marseille picket
(about 2 hours later)
Strikes have have spread to all eight of France’s oil refineries, the CGT union has said, as police used water cannon and teargas to break up a picket blocking access to the Fos-sur-Mer refinery in Marseille.
The pre-dawn police operation followed warnings from the government that attempts to strangle fuel supplies in a dispute over contested labour law reforms would not be tolerated.
The action marked an escalation in the standoff between François Hollande’s government and the hardline CGT union, which is seeking to turn various protests and stoppages into full-scale rolling strikes at ports, oil refineries and railways. French riot police have used water cannon and tear gas to break up a strike picket blocking access to a large oil refinery near Marseille as the government faces a showdown from trade unions attempting to paralyse the country’s fuel supply network in protest at labour reforms.
Emmanuel Lépine of the CGT said about 40 busloads of riot police took part in an operation “of unprecedented violence“. The pre-dawn police raids to force down a picket-line at the Exxon Mobil Fos-Sur-Mer refinery marked an escalation in the standoff between the French president, François Hollande, and protesters led by the CGT union.
Workers at the Fos refinery, which belongs to US-based Exxon Mobil, are taking part in a broader series of strikes and pickets in the sector. The union is seeking to force the government to withdraw its planned labour reforms with rolling strikes and picket-line blockades at refineries and fuel depots as well as open-ended rail strikes.
The CGT union said strikes had spread to all eight of France’s refineries. “Output is going to fall by at least 50%,” Lépine said. Six out of eight of the refineries in France have either stopped operating or have reduced output due to strikes and blockades. The CGT said strike action had been voted at all eight of France’s refineries, and denounced the police raid on the refinery near Marseille as an operation “of unprecedented violence”.
Beyond the stoppages by refinery workers, pickets by dockers, truckers and other protesters have been blocking deliveries in and out of fuel distribution depots for days, sparking panic buying and shortages at hundreds of petrol stations. There were long traffic jams at scores of fuel pumps across France as regular motorists, taxis and delivery drivers tried to stock up on petrol fearing a fuel shortage.
The government has said there are sufficient supplies to ride out the stoppages, but French oil firm Total said earlier this week that hundreds of its 2,200 petrol stations had either partly or completely run out of fuel. Motorists have been uploading details of petrol stations where they have encountered problems. The transport minister, Alain Vidalies, said one in five of the country’s 12,500 petrol stations were either completely dry or out of one type of fuel, a week after oil workers began the strike. Motorists in the Paris region resorted to tracking down fuel tankers and following them to petrol stations. In the north-east, motorists were driving over the border to stock up in Belgium.
The CGT has also called rolling strikes of more than two days a week on the national railways and for an open-ended strike on the Paris subway and suburban commuter train networks from 2 June, a week before the Euro 2016 football tournament kicks off. The government vowed to break the blockades and “liberate” other oil refinery sites. The prime minister, Manuel Valls, said: “We will continue to clear the sites, the depots, which are today blocked by this organisation.” Hollande said the strike action represented a minority of activists.
The CGT’s leader, Philippe Martinez, said: “We’ll see this through to the finish, to withdrawal of the labour law. This is a government which has turned its back on its promises and we are now seeing the consequences.”
The CGT’s new hardline strategy against Hollande’s labour reforms comes after three months of street protests that brought hundreds of thousands of protesters on to the streets. Earlier this month, the Socialist government – lacking the parliamentary backing to vote in the reforms that would make it easier for employers to hire and fire workers – used a special decree to force the bill into law.
Related: François Hollande pushes through labour bill with special decree
After repeated street demonstrations failed to budge the government, the CGT union has toughened its strategy, organising rolling strikes at oil refineries and some ports. It has also called on its members to stage weekly strikes on state railways. An open-ended strike by members of certain unions on the Paris Métro and suburban commuter train network has been called for 2 June, a week before the Euro 2016 football tournament opens.
The grim mood has been compounded by violence on the margins of demonstrations and violent skirmishes between demonstrators and police in recent weeks. Several Socialist party offices in towns in France have had windows smashed or graffitied. In the early hours of Monday morning, the Socialist party office in Grenoble was left pock-marked by 12 bullets.
The CGT’s brinkmanship strategy also marks a battle for influence inside an organisation that was once France’s biggest trade union group but is now facing competition from other unions. The standoff is intended to send a message about the nature of a trade union’s role, with the CGT attempting to show itself as a counter-power to the government at a time when Hollande is facing growing dissent from leftwing voters.
Medef, France’s employers’ organisation, called on the government to “re-establish the rule of law”.
Hollande, who still hopes to run again for office next year despite being France’s least popular president on record, had feared an “end of term” protest movement echoing that faced by Nicolas Sarkozy over pension reforms at the end of his term in 2010.
Certain polls show that if Hollande runs again in 2017, he could risk being knocked out of the final round by the far-fight Front National’s Marine Le Pen.