Ukrainian Coal Miners Threaten Strike Over Back Wages

Excerpt from report by Ukrainian news agency UNIAN

Kiev, 30 September: On 28 September the council of heads of the Independent Trade Union of Coal Miners of Ukraine decided to declare a pre-strike readiness at enterprises of the Ukrainian coal mining industry from 1 October 2005 to prevent the collapse of the coal industry.

This is said in the trade union’s resolution, which was sent to UNIAN.

Heads of the trade union branches were instructed to prepare working teams for a large-scale protest. The date of the protest will be set by the trade union boss, Mykhaylo Volynets, following consultations with heads of local and regional branches of the trade union.

The resolution says that the trade union intends to demand the timely payment of current wages, repayment of back wages and wage increases in the industry from the president [Viktor Yushchenko], the Supreme Council [parliament], the Cabinet of Ministers and the Coal Ministry.

The trade union also demands that the country’s leadership should earmark no less than 5.6bn hryvnyas [more than 1.1bn dollars] to the coal mining industry from the 2005 state budget and should raise the price of coal to the level of market prices.

The trade union also demands that reform or privatization should not be carried out in the coal industry without agreement with trade unions.

[Passage omitted: The resolution criticizes the current state of affairs in the coal industry.]