Unions announce three-hour strike over austerity measures

GOVERNMENT workers’ unions have decided today to hold a three-hour strike next Thursday to protest against a decision for austerity measures without prior dialogue. 

The strike, which ill start at 10 am, will not affect vital services such as hospitals, airports and ports, the unions said.

Striking civil servants will also march to Parliament, which will be discussing the 2012 budget at that time.

Unions are irked over being left out of a process that led to a decision to freeze broader state wages for two years and other austerity measures.

The freeze includes pay scale rises and cost of living allowance payments.

Cyprus is racing to put measures in place to avoid a bailout and EU sanctions for fiscal violations.

 

 

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.