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Military to supply fuel to Greece as strike continues
Europe News.Net
Saturday 31st July, 2010
The government of Greece held a crisis cabinet meeting amid a crippling lorry drivers’ strike Friday that cut the country’s fuel supplies and announced that the military would be mobilized to supply fuel to the country.
A government spokesperson said that the military would use tankers and naval hardware such as landing craft, to supply fuel to critical sectors across the mainland and the many Greek Isles.
The decision came just hours after the lorry drivers ignored an emergency order by the government for them to return to work.
The strike has brought the already beleaguered economy of Greece to a near standstill.
Fuel shortages have played havoc with transport and hotels across the mainland, which rely on guests to drive to their locations, have reported vast decreases in occupancy while travel agents are reporting mass cancellations of trips by foreigners.
Foreign tourism is a major source of revenue for Greece.
The critical sectors identified by the government were listed as power plants and hospitals.
“The armed forces with their own means are already assuring the supply of critical sectors such as airports, electricity plants and hospitals,” said a statement by the national government.
The rare emergency order for strikers to disperse is a sign of the government’s interest in getting the economy functioning properly again, a critical ingredient to recovering from its vast debt crisis.
The lorry drivers are striking because of a directive by government that will lower the cost of obtaining a lorry license. The charge is currently very high, creating a select group that trades the licenses, sometimes for many hundreds of Euros.
However, among the conditions of an IMF bailout loan, the government is required to overhaul the trucking industry and make it more competitive.  Email this story to a friend
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