Nov 27, 2002 By Jamey Keaten Associated Press Writer 3 min read

PARIS (AP) – Hundreds of flights around Europe were canceled Tuesday after French air traffic controllers walked off the job as part of a nationwide protest by civil servants. The air traffic controllers joined postal workers, bus and subway drivers, hospital workers, and electricity and telephone utility staff in the strike over pay, retirement benefits and the French government’s privatization plans.

The strikes are the biggest labor challenge yet for the 5-month-old government of center-right Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, which has made a priority of selling off the state’s stake in many French companies to raise cash.

Only about one in five scheduled flights were expected to take off or land in Paris’ Orly and Charles de Gaulle airports during the day.

Service in France and elsewhere in Europe was the hardest hit, officials said. Long-haul flights to destinations such as the United States, Asia and Africa were less affected, the Paris airports authority said.

Only 17 percent of daily scheduled flights passed through Orly, and 22 percent at de Gaulle. The strike began Monday evening and was expected to continue until 6 a.m. today.

Italian carrier Alitalia said three out of four of its daily 90 flights between France and Italy were canceled. Hungary’s national airline, Malev, was forced to cancel 10 flights into or out of Paris for the duration of the 32-hour strike, a company spokeswoman said.

Scandinavian Airlines canceled 27 flights linking Paris and the French Riviera town of Nice to Oslo, Norway; Copenhagen, Denmark and Stockholm, Sweden.

AENA, Spain’s national aviation authority, said about 130 flights between Spain and France were canceled Tuesday and use of French airspace even by flights that didn’t land in France was hindered.

At Frankfurt airport, the busiest in continental Europe, the walkout caused the cancellation of 72 flights, airport spokesman Robert Payne said.

The havoc for travelers in France wasn’t limited to those in the skies.

Bottlenecks formed on platforms in many Paris subway stations in morning rush hour. Commuters in the cities of Toulouse, Bordeaux and Marseille also faced sharp service cutbacks in buses and subways.

The powerful Communist-aligned CGT union helped organize the strike, which was expected to include demonstrations in many cities across the country.

In Paris, tens of thousands of public employees, many lighting flares that formed huge clouds of smoke, marched through the city. Thousands more marched through the Mediterranean port city of Marseille.

On Monday, striking truckers blockaded dozens of highways in a protest over pay. The roadblocks came down by day’s end as police stepped in to keep traffic running smoothly.

Two top truckers unions, whose dispute is with management – not the government – had vowed to revive the protest, but the blockades didn’t appear to be going up on a large scale.