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French down tools over reforms
PARIS, France (Reuters) -- Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets of France on Thursday in a public sector strike against state pension reforms, crippling rail and air traffic. Many schools were shut as more than half the country's teachers also stayed away from work. Organizers said 700,000 people had taken part in scores of rallies across the country -- police put the total at 320,000. In Paris, protesters paraded waving the red flags of the large CGT union leading the one-day strike. Organizers said 80,000 took part in the march, police put attendance at 26,000. "The government's tactics border on fascism," said town hall worker Marc Estrada. "The public response speaks for itself." The strikes come as the conservative government prepares to unveil plans on April 11 to overhaul France's pay-as-you-go pension system, creaking under the weight of an ageing population. Similar reform plans were abandoned by the previous conservative government after crippling strikes in 1995, and were partly blamed for the administration's downfall in 1997. With air traffic controllers joining the strike, national carrier Air France said it canceled 55 percent of its domestic and European flights but its long-haul services flew as normal. Air authorities said up to 80 percent of French air traffic would be affected in total. German airline Lufthansa said the strike forced it to cancel 60 round-trips to France, stranding 5,000 passengers. Irish no-frills carrier Ryanair scrapped all its 33 flights and British Airways cancelled 95 out of 120. Commuters on the Paris metro faced delays of several hours and there were skeleton services on urban and regional train routes into the French capital. One out of two high-speed domestic TGV train services were cancelled on some routes. Pavements thronged with people walking to work. Some businessmen rollerbladed in their suits, clutching briefcases. One of the biggest protests took place in Marseille, where organizers said between 60,000 and 80,000 public and private sector workers marched through the Mediterranean port city. Police said the figure was half that. A poll published in Le Parisien daily showed 72 percent of French people backed the protests, but a similar number said they had sympathy with the government. Thursday's strikes are the latest popular protests against the reform, which the government aims to pass through parliament by the summer. Two months ago, some 300,000 people took to the streets in over 100 French towns in protest at the shake-up. Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin is expected to push for public sector employees, who now contribute for 37 1/2 years to qualify for full pension rights, to be brought in line with their private sector colleagues who pay for 40 years. Unions, on the contrary, are demanding that private sector workers be brought in line with those in the public sector. They suspect Raffarin's proposal is just the first move in a wider plan to make people retire later and push employees into supplementing state pensions with private "top-up" schemes. The standard age of retirement is currently 60. "The government's logic is: make employees pay for their own pension at a time when the demographics and the jobs market are against them," CGT leader Bernard Thibault told French TV. Thibault said unions accepted the need to cover a funding gap in the system, which some estimates put at up to 150 billion euros ($162 billion) by 2040, but insist employees should not carry the full burden. Copyright 2003 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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