Bolivian strike ends

Press, 25 August 1986, Page 10

Bolivian strike ends

NZPA-Reuter La Paz Bolivian workers, have ended a two-day strike, and they promise fresh protests against the Government’s austerity policies and the presence of the United States Army airmen helping in an anti-cocaine drive. Leaders of the Bolivian Labour Confederation told a rally ending the stoppage that they would continue to press for an end to a nine-month-old wage freeze, lifting of a 10 per cent sales tax, and the withdrawal of the 170 Americans. The strike shut down mines, factories, schools, flights, and train services across the country. The possibility of more unrest was emphasised by a union announcement that 5000 miners from the tin mining centre of Oruro, 210 km south of La Paz, the capital, had begun a march on the city to fight for their jobs at mines threatened with closure. Several thousand striking miners, some setting off dynamite, marched on Oruro’s central square on Friday.

A collapse in the world price of tin was largely responsible for a SUS 246 million ($494 million) loss last year in the nationalised tin industry. The Americans, and six Black Hawk helicopters, arrived on July. 14 to back a campaign against drug producers who are believed to supply the raw material for nearly half the world’s cocaine.