High oil prices, protests around the world
June 8th, 2008 by Jim JustReuters has a piece on how are people around the globe reacting to soaring fuel costs.
- Britain: Hundreds of protesting truck drivers blocked London roads on May 28, causing chaos. Almost a week later fishermen’s groups massed in the center of the capital to demand urgent government aid to protect them from rising fuel costs.
- Brussels: Police clash with hundreds of fishermen protesting against the high cost of fuel outside the headquarters of the European Union. The fishermen say they will go out of business unless the EU allows national governments to give them more financial aid and subsidize their fuel.
- France: Lorries and taxis blocked a major motorway in Paris and called for low-cost diesel on Tuesday. French fishermen have been on strike for several weeks over the price of diesel, and have been joined in recent days fishermen from the UK, Spain, Portugal and Italy, who have blockaded ports across Europe.
- Bulgaria: More than 150 truck drivers and dozens of bus drivers from across Bulgaria converged in a convoy on the outskirts of the capital Sofia on May 28, saying high fuel prices meant they were operating at a loss.
- Chile: Thousands of Chilean drivers parked their trucks along national highways on Tuesday to protest soaring fuel prices in a tacit rejection of the government’s $1 billion dollar (509 million pound) cash subsidy to consumer fuel prices.
- Italy: Commercial fishermen went on strike on May 30, closing down the industry on both coasts.
- India: Leftist parties, key allies of the ruling coalition, called for a week of nationwide protests and strikes after India raised petrol and diesel prices by 10 percent on Wednesday. Even after the rise, fuel prices in Asia’s third-largest oil consumer are lagging far behind international prices.
- Indonesia: Hundreds of Indonesian students and police clashed in May 26 protests sparked by an almost 30 percent fuel price hike. Days before, police detained dozens as 2,000 people marched on Jakarta’s presidential palace, and similar rallies took place in Medan, North Sumatra, and Surabaya, East Java.
- Portugal: Portuguese fishermen stayed in port on May 30, as part of a wave of protests in European commercial fisheries.
- Spain: Almost the entire Spanish fleet, by far Europe’s biggest, stayed in port on May 30, calling for government action to lower fuel prices. Madrid fishermen handed out 20 tonnes of free fish, calling it worthless because of rock-bottom prices.