On March 5, a convoy of 900 Vilvoorde workers drove across the border to Douai in northern France, to a factory proposed to take the work of the Vilvoorde plant. Workers there promptly stopped work and joined in the demonstration. Workers at the Vilvoorde plant are planning a series of demonstrations in Paris and Brussels for March 16; auto workers across Europe have pledged support. Renault also plans to use early retirement, part-time work and other methods to cut 2,764 jobs from its French operations. The automaker had already cut 1,600 jobs with similar measures last year.

France: public employees strike
Chanting "Enough austerity!" tens of thousands of public employees marched in Paris and other cities March 6. They demanded pay raises in a 24-hour strike after French prime minister Alan Juppé froze salaries last year as part of an austerity plan. This year, the government has offered a 1 percent raise. Seven major unions supported the public employees strike - the third such action since last September. Schools were especially affected, as about 50 percent of the teachers at some primary school struck.

Bonn faces antinuclear protests
More than 15,000 people joined in protests March 5-6 as the German government moved truckloads of nuclear waste to be dumped in the northern town of Gorleben. Protesters blocked the main roads by cementing tractors to the pavement, digging deep holes, and covering up alternate routes. A force of 30,000 police officers was deployed to protect the 540 tons of radioactive cargo, in what Reuters described as Bonn's "largest postwar security operation." Some protesters threw stones and firebombs at the cops. German police arrested 250 protesters. Meanwhile, unemployment in Germany rose again in February to a new postwar high of 12.2 percent.

Shipyard closes in Poland
The Gdansk shipyard, famous as the birthplace of the trade union Solidarity, which emerged as workers rose up against the bureaucratic Stalinist government in Poland in the 1980s, began laying off its last 3,600 workers March 6. The shipyard employed 7,500 workers before it was declared bankrupt last August. The state bank, PeKaO SA, rejected a request for a $100 million loan because Gdansk's "business plan did not guarantee a profit," the Associated Press reported. Last June workers at the Gdansk shipyard in Warsaw struck to protest the Polish government's plans to close the facility. They demanded back wages and called on the government to find a way to keep the shipyard open. Gdansk is 60 percent owned by the government. "People are very much embittered by this situation. They are blaming everyone, the government, Solidarity, [former president Lech] Walesa," said Witek Pawlak, who has worked there for 22 years.

Tel Aviv gives `minimum' land
Palestinians protested in the West Bank city of Beit Omar over the delay in the withdrawal of Tel Aviv's occupation force from their area. Protesters threw rocks and bottles at Israeli troops, as the soldiers fired tear gas at the crowd. After a heated debate March 7, the Israeli cabinet voted 10- 7 to approve the latest troop removal from the West Bank. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his cabinet that he had given up "the necessary minimum" of land. Palestinian Liberation Organization leader Yasir Arafat said the 9 percent pullback, which was supposed to start on March 7, but will be extended several days, fell far short of expectations and violated accords between his organization and the Zionist regime.

Tamil rebels continue fight
In the heaviest fighting since January, the Tamil Tiger rebels waged a three-prong attack on the government in Sri Lanka March 6. The rebels hit a base at Vavunativu and another on the China Bay. At the same time, about 300 rebels attacked the air force's eastern headquarters, firing rockets and mortars at planes on the tarmac, a Sri Lankan military official reported. The Tamils are fighting for a homeland and an end to discriminatory policies by the Sinhalese majority. Tamils make up 18 percent of Sri Lanka's 18 million people. More than 48,000 people have been killed in the 13-year war.

Colombia renews spraying coca
On March 5, the government of Colombia suspended a program that sprayed coca crops as part of an eradication effort backed by Washington. The move was in retaliation for the U.S. government's "decertification" of Colombia, for the second year in a row, for what the New York Times described as "failing to cooperate fully with the United States in antidrug efforts." Washington had accused Bogotá of allowing a 32 percent increase in the cultivation of coca last year. Two days after halting it, Bogotá reinstated the coca eradication program. In a clear swipe at Washington, Justice Minister Carlos Medellín said he would ask the French government's help in verifying Washington's crop estimates.

Ten hospitals to close in Toronto
A government commission announced March 6 that it recommends closing 10 of Toronto's hospitals to cut costs. The move would put thousands of people out of work and eliminate 1,750 beds, more than 20 percent of the city's total. Also slated to close is Ontario's only French- language hospital, Monfort Hospital in Ottawa. These cuts in Ontario have been duplicated in every Canadian province. In Alberta, authorities executed a mock disaster they claimed would demonstrate that emergency care wouldn't suffer from the planned closure of the only hospital in downtown Calgary with a trauma unit.

Police raze homeless in NYC
Cops carrying flashlights and axes surrounded Manhattan's last large homeless encampment February 26 and used bulldozers to demolish the makeshift homes where some 45 men and women had lived for the last three years along a stretch of old rail yards. City officials accelerated the long- planned action, because the encampment is part of an area where real estate magnate Donald Trump plans to construct a luxury complex. The Coalition for the Homeless estimates there are 100,000 homeless people in New York City.

`Three strikes' doesn't cut crime
"Three strikes" laws mandating long sentences for those convicted of three offenses have not brought down crime, according to a study released by the Justice Policy Institute. In 1994-95, both violent and overall crime rates dropped more in the 37 states without the three strikes laws than in the 13 with them. In California, where the laws were aggressively carried out, the state imprisoned more than 15,000 offenders in two years. Since 1995, 11 other states have implemented three-strikes laws.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Justice Department reported March 6, that one out of every 20 U.S. residents will spend time behind bars. "At current levels of incarceration a Black male in the United States today has greater than a one in four chance of going to prison during his lifetime," the report said. The chance for Hispanic males is 16 percent, compared with 4.4 percent for white males.

- MEGAN ARNEY  
 
 
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