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A convoy of 20 fuel tanker trucks taking fuel
into Barcelona this week were escorted by police as a protest strike by thousands of truckers
against rising fuel prices caused shortages and huge tailbacks on the
Spanish-French border.
Tens of thousands of truckers in Spain,
France and Portugal are on strike or joining the protests - leading to
warnings of shortages of fuel and other essential items. French railway
workers launched their own stoppage, increasing the transport chaos.
Authorities in northern Spain ordered emergency measures after many gas
stations in the Catalonia region bordering France ran out of fuel.
"Twenty tanker trucks escorted by the regional police left an
industrial zone this morning for Barcelona port to help supply and
distribute to service stations in the region," a regional police spokesman
told AFP.
Forty percent of gas stations in Catalonia have run out of fuel,
according to Manuel Amado, president of the Catalonia Federation of
Service Stations.
Truckers demanding greater government help have stopped trucks from
crossing the French-Spain frontier and caused major tailbacks around
major Spanish cities, including Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia.
Spanish and French truckers staged pickets on either side of the
frontier between the two countries. They blocked a bridge on the border
at Bidassoa in the western Basque region and other main crossing
points.
On the French side, service areas on motorways were packed with trucks
from the border right back to Bordeaux, about 200 kilometers (125
miles) away.
Spain's second largest hauliers' union Fenadismer, which claims to
represent 70,000 out of Spain's 380,000 truck drivers, launched an
open-ended strike last Monday.
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