From:Libcom.org
The 24h public sector general strike supplemented by private sector strikes has brought Greece to a standstill with no airplanes flying in or out the country.
It is the first big strike in Greece since the announcement of the austerity measures by the socialist government last week. And it has managed to bring the country to a standstill: the 24h strike of the public sector under the union umbrella of ADEDY has seen a complete freeze in the following fronts - all civil servants, including tax offices, social security, municipal and county workers; all doctors and nurses (except emergency personnel); all teachers at all school grades and all university teaching staff and personnel; all archeological sites (Acropolis shut); all air traffic control (no flights in or out of the country). Also in the means of mass transport, rolling stoppages of work are being performed in the National Railway System, and the suburban railway system of Athens.
The public sector strike has been further supplemented by strikes in the private sector. PAME the Communist Party umbrella union has called a 24h strike affecting large sections of the private sector, while at the same time several Autonomous unions have call a strike further hampering the private sector. The latter include: the books and printed material workers of Athens and the workers of Wind Telecom. The PAME strike is affecting a big range of private business that cannot be accurately reproduced here but include: Carrefur-Dia workers, elevator maintenance workers and construction builders. It is worth noting that all hydrofoil transport from Peiraeus and Igoumenitsa to the islands has frozen due to the strike.
At the time of writing different demos and strike related protest marches are unfolding in various cities of the country. In Athens, tension built up between protesters and the riot police forces (MAT) when the former tried to break trough police lines with the help of a garbage collecting vehicle (see picture, above).
Lat Monday, in relation to the austerity measures, anarchists broke in the central conference of the industrialists association of north greece on whose panel sat the Minister of National Economy. The protesters held banners against the sold out union bosses and soiled the conference with the help of "rotten-potato bombs" and other foul smelling devices, disrupting its procedures.
Reactions to the austerity measures are expected to augment after the announcement of the new tax scheme and in expectation of the social security reforms, a front that has in the past caused mass and massively dynamic protests in the country
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