Agreement Ends Macabre Serbia Strike

Representatives of Serbian government and a group to textile workers who have been on hunger strike in protest to what they see as the authorities’ indifference to their plight agreed this week to a plan which establishes deadlines for paying outstanding money to the workers.

The workers of the textile mill ‘Raska’ who have been on strike since 23 April, and had locked themselves inside the offices of the Association of Textile Workers, demanded they be paid backdated money owed to them going back as far as 1993, and had resorted to desperate measures in order to highlight their cause.

At one point the strike’s leader Zoran Bulatovic cut off his finger and, as he claims, ate it.  "I am terminating the hunger strike. As of today, I will resume eating. I will eat parts of my body," he said, as he unfolded his finger wrapped in paper outside the offices of the Association of Textile Workers.

He later said he would cut off his arm and send it to the government.

Other workers have threatened to follow suit.  "I am prepared to do the same. I will go to the end," reiterated on several occasions Senada Rebronja, a single mother with three children - one of which has special needs, who also locked herself inside the offices of the Association of Textile Workers.

It was not clear how many workers locked themselves inside the offices.

Government and local authority representatives had appealed to the workers not to take such drastic measures. Labour Minister Rasim Ljajic asked the workers not to radicalize their protests, and supported Novi Pazar’s decision to turn ‘Raska’, which employed some 4,000 workers, into a state owned company after it was clear that the textile mill was but a step away from bankruptcy.

"It is most realistic that textile mill Raska become owned by the city of Novi Pazar," said Ljajic.

According to the agreement between government and textile workers, the number of years worked by each worker will be added up, and they will receive the welfare and salaries owed to them accordingly. This agreement meets the workers’ main demands.

In addition, creditors have a deadline of 3 May this year to sign contracts with ‘Raska’ on the conversion of claims to the company’s capital, after which ‘Raska’ will submit a request to change the company’s ownership structure.