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World

France hit by new wave of strikes against Macron’s pension reform

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  • Reform would raise retirement age to 64
  • Schools, transport networks, refinery deliveries hit
  • Macron: Reform vital to ensure viability of pension system

SAINT-NAZAIRE, France, Jan 31 (Reuters) – Striking workers disrupted French refinery deliveries, public transport and schools on Tuesday in a second day of nationwide protests over President Emmanuel Macron’s plan to make people work longer before retirement.

Crowds marched through cities across France to denounce a reform that raises the retirement age by two years to 64 and which is a test of Macron’s ability to push through change now that he has lost his working majority in parliament.

On the rail networks, only one in every three high-speed TGV trains were operating and even fewer local and regional trains. Services on the Paris metro were thrown into disarray.

Buoyed by their success earlier in the month when more than a million people took to the streets, trade unions which have been battling to maintain their power and influence urged the public to turnout en masse.

“We won’t drive until we’re 64!” bus driver Isabelle Texier said at a protest in Saint-Nazaire on the Atlantic coast, adding that many careers involved tough working conditions.

Others felt resigned ahead of likely bargaining between Macron’s ruling alliance and conservative opponents who are more open to pension reform than the left.

“There’s no point in going on strike. This bill will be adopted in any case,” said 34-year-old Matthieu Jacquot, who works in the luxury sector.

Unions said half of primary school teachers had walked off the job. TotalEnergies (TTEF.PA) said 55% of its workers on morning shifts at its refineries had downed tools, a lower number than on Jan. 19. The hard-left CGT union said the figure was inaccurate.

For unions, the challenge will be maintaining a strike movement at a time when high inflation is eroding salaries.

At a local level, some announced “Robin Hood” operations unauthorised by the government. In the southwestern Lot-et-Garonne area, the local CGT trade union branch cut power to several speed cameras and disabled smart power meters.

“When there is such a massive opposition, it would be dangerous for the government not to listen,” said Mylene Jacquot, secretary general of the CFDT union’s civil servants branch.

[1/16] Protesters attend a demonstration against French government’s pension reform plan in Paris as part of a day of national strike and protests in France, January 31, 2023. REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes

Opinion polls show a substantial majority of the French oppose the reform, but Macron intends to stand his ground. The reform was “vital” to ensure the viability of the pension system, he said on Monday.

A street march in Paris takes place later in the day.

‘BRUTAL’

The pension system reform would yield an additional 17.7 billion euros ($19.18 billion) in annual pension contributions, according to Labour Ministry estimates.

Unions say there are other ways to raise revenue, such as taxing the super rich or asking employers or well-off pensioners to contribute more.

“This reform is unfair and brutal,” said Luc Farre, the secretary general of the civil servants’ UNSA union. “Moving (the pension age) to 64 is going backwards, socially.”

French power supply was down by 4.5% or 3 gigawatts (GW), as workers at nuclear reactors and thermal plants joined the strike, data from utility group EDF (EDF.PA) showed.

TotalEnergies said deliveries of petroleum products from its French sites had been halted because of the strike, but that customers’ needs were met.

The government made some concessions while drafting the legislation. Macron had originally wanted the retirement age to be set at 65, while the government is also promising a minimum pension of 1,200 euros a month.

Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne has said the 64 threshold is “non-negotiable”, but the government is exploring ways to offset some of the impact, particularly on women.

Hard-left opposition figure Jean-Luc Melenchon, a vocal critic of the reform, said parliament would on Monday debate a motion calling for a referendum on the matter.

“The French are not stupid,” he said at a march in Marseille. “If this reform is vital, it should be possible to convince the people.”

Reporting by Forrest Crellin, Benjamin Mallet, Sudip Kar-Gupta, Leigh Thomas, Blandine Henault, Michel Rose, Dominique Vidalon, Benoit Van Overstraeten; Writing by Ingrid Melander and Richard Lough; Editing by Janet Lawrence

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World

New Zealand counts cost of Auckland floods, more rain forecast

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WELLINGTON, Jan 30 (Reuters) – Flood-ravaged Auckland is forecast to receive further heavy rain in the coming days, authorities in New Zealand’s largest city said on Monday, as insurers counted the costs of what looks likely to be the country’s most expensive weather event ever.

Four people lost their lives in flash floods and landslides that hit Auckland over the last three days amid record downpours. A state of emergency remains in place in Auckland. A state of emergency in the Waitomo region south of Auckland was lifted.

Flights in and out of Auckland Airport are still experiencing delays and cancellations, beaches around the city of 1.6 million are closed and all Auckland schools will remain closed until Feb. 7.

“There has been very significant damage across Auckland,” New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins told state-owned television station TVNZ on Monday. “Obviously there were a number of homes damaged by flooding but also extensive earth movements.”

Currently, around 350 people were in need of emergency accommodation, he added.

LOOMING CLOUDS

Metservice is forecasting further heavy rains to hit the already sodden city late on Tuesday.

“We have more adverse weather coming and we need to prepare for that,” Auckland Emergency Management duty controller Rachel Kelleher told a media conference.

Fire and Emergency services received 30 callouts overnight Monday, including responding to a landslide when a carport slid down a hill.

The council has designated 69 houses as uninhabitable and has prevented people from entering them. A further 300 properties were deemed at risk, with access restricted to certain areas for short periods.

The north of New Zealand’s North Island is receiving more rain than normal due to the La Nina weather event.

The National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) said Auckland has already recorded more than eight times its average January rainfall and 40% of its annual average rainfall.

INSURERS FACE HEFTY BILL

The cost of the clean up is expected to top the NZ$97 million ($63 million) bill for flooding on the West Coast in 2021 but will not be anywhere near as expensive as the estimated NZ$31 billion insured costs of two major earthquakes in Christchurch in 2010-2011, said Insurance Council of New Zealand spokesperson Christian Judge.

Insurance Australia Group’s (IAG.AX) New Zealand divisions have received over 5,000 claims so far and Suncorp Group (SUN.AX) said it received around 3,000 claims across the Vero and AA Insurance Brands. New Zealand’s Tower (TWR.NZ) said it had received around 1,900 claims.

“The number of claims is expected to rise further over the coming days, with the event still unfolding and as customers identify damage to their property,” IAG said in a statement.

Economists say the recovery and rebuild could add to inflationary pressures in New Zealand as vehicles and household goods need to be replaced and there is an increase in construction work needed to repair or rebuild houses and infrastructure damaged by the flooding.

($1 = 1.5385 New Zealand dollars)

Reporting by Lucy Craymer; Editing by Aurora Ellis and Lincoln Feast

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US

U.S. airports rumble back to life after FAA computer outage

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WASHINGTON, Jan 11 (Reuters) – U.S. flights were slowly beginning to resume departures and a ground stop was lifted after the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) scrambled to fix a system outage overnight that had forced a halt to all U.S. departing flights.

The cause of the problem, which delayed thousands of flights in the United States, was unclear, but U.S. officials said they had so far found no evidence of a cyberattack.

“Normal air traffic operations are resuming gradually across the U.S. following an overnight outage to the Notice to Air Missions system that provides safety info to flight crews. The ground stop has been lifted. We continue to look into the cause of the initial problem” the FAA said in a Tweet.

More than 4,300 flights had been delayed and 700 canceled as officials said it will take hours to recover from the halt to flights.

The FAA had earlier ordered airlines to pause all domestic departures after its pilot alerting system crashed and the agency had to perform a hard reset around 2 a.m., officials said.

The FAA said shortly before 8:30 a.m. departures were resuming at Newark and Atlanta airports.

The FAA is expected to implement a ground delay program in order to address the backlog of flights halted for hours. Flights already in the air had been allowed to continue to their destinations during the ground stop.

U.S. President Joe Biden ordered the Transportation Department to investigate the outage and said the cause of the failure was unknown at this time. Asked if a cyber attack was behind the outage, Biden told reporters at the White House, “We don’t know.”

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg pledged “an after-action process to determine root causes and recommend next steps.”

The FAA said it was working to restore the Notice to Air Missions system that alerts pilots to hazards and changes to airport facilities and procedures that had stopped processing updated information.

A total of 4,314 U.S. flights were delayed as of 9:04 a.m. ET, flight tracking website FlightAware showed. Another 737 were canceled.

MODERNIZATION NEEDED

United said it has resumed operations. The Chicago-based carrier, however, warned that customers might continue to see some delays and cancellations.

Shares of U.S. carriers fell in Wednesday’s premarket trading. Southwest Airlines (LUV.N) was down 2.4%, while Delta Air Lines Inc (DAL.N), United Airlines (UAL.O) and American Airlines (AAL.O) were down about 1%.

“America’s transportation network desperately needs significant upgrades … We call on federal policymakers to modernize our vital air travel infrastructure.” said Geoff Freeman, President and CEO of the U.S. Travel Association, a group representing U.S. airlines, hotels, car rental companies, and theme parks.

FAA’s system outage comes weeks after an operational meltdown at Southwest at the end of last year left thousands of passengers stranded.

A severe winter storm right before Christmas coupled with the Texas-based carrier’s dated technology led to over 16,000 flight cancellations last month.

The DOT, FAA’s parent agency, heavily criticized Southwest’s failures and pressured the airline to compensate passengers for missed flights and other related costs. There is no legal requirement that the FAA must compensate passengers for flight delays caused by agency computer issues.

ESSENTIAL INFORMATION

A NOTAM is a notice containing information essential to personnel concerned with flight operations, but not known far enough in advance to be publicized by other means.

Information can go up to 200 pages for long-haul international flights and may include items such as runway closures, bird hazard warnings and construction obstacles.

United Airlines (UAL.O) said it had temporarily delayed all domestic flights and would issue an update when it learned more from the FAA.

Germany’s Lufthansa and Air France both said they were continuing to operate flights to and from the United States, while the French airline said it was monitoring the situation.

The operator of Paris international airports – Paris Charles de Gaulle airport and Orly airport – said it expects delays to flights.

Austin-Bergstrom International Airport said on Twitter that ground stops across the country were causing delays. A ground stop is an air traffic control measure that slows or halts aircraft at a given airport.

In an earlier advisory on its website, the FAA said its NOTAM system had “failed”, although NOTAMs issued before the outage were still viewable. Earlier this month, a problem with a different airline computer control system delayed dozens of flights in Florida.

A total of 21,464 flights are scheduled to depart airports in the United States on Wednesday with a carrying capacity of nearly 2.9 million passengers, data from Cirium shows.

American Airlines has the most departures from U.S. airports with 4,819 flights scheduled, followed by Delta and Southwest, Cirium data showed.

Reporting by Doina Chiacu and David Shepardson in Washington, Abhijith Ganapavaram in Bengaluru, Jamie Freed in Sydney and Rajesh Kumar Singh in Chicago; Additional reporting by Nathan Gomes and Steve Holland in Washington
Writing by Shailesh Kuber and Alexander Smith Editing by Edmund Blair and Nick Zieminski

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World

Syria says Israel strike puts Damascus airport briefly out of service

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AMMAN, Jan 2 (Reuters) – The Syrian army said on Monday an Israeli missile strike had briefly put the Damascus International Airport out of service, the latest in a string of strikes targeting Iran-linked assets.

A volley of air-launched missiles had hit the airport at 2 a.m., the army said in a statement. They had come from the direction of Lake Tiberias in Israel.

Missiles had also hit targets in the south of Damascus, killing two members of the Syrian armed forces and causing some damage, the army said.

The transport ministry said in an online statement that workers had removed debris from the strikes and that flights would resume by 9 a.m.

Earlier, two regional intelligence sources said the strikes had hit an outpost near the airport of Iran’s Quds Force and militias it backs. Their presence has spread in Syria in recent years.

The Israel Defence Force did not immediately comment on the attack.

Last year, Israel intensified strikes on Damascus International and other civilian airports to disrupt Tehran’s increasing use of aerial supply lines to deliver arms to allies in Syria and Lebanon, including Hezbollah.

Syria halted flights to and from the airport in June for nearly two weeks after Israeli strikes caused extensive damage to infrastructure, including a runway and a terminal.

Israel fired missiles at Damascus International again in September, when it also struck the country’s second-largest civilian airport in the northern city of Aleppo, putting it out of operation for several days.

Western and regional intelligence sources say Tehran has adopted civilian air transportation as a more reliable means of ferrying military equipment to its forces and to allied fighters in Syria, following Israeli disruption of ground supply.

Israel says its so-called “campaign between wars” in Syria began a decade ago, on Jan 30, 2013, with a strike against Russian-supplied SA-17 air-defence batteries that Damascus had intended to hand over to Hezbollah.

Four such strikes took place that year, but the pace had accelerated to around one a week currently, the chief of Israel’s armed forces, Lieutenant-General Aviv Kohavi, said last month.

Iran’s proxy militias, led by Lebanon’s Hezbollah, now hold sway in vast areas in eastern, southern and northwestern Syria and in several suburbs around the capital.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government has never publicly acknowledged that Iranian forces operate on his behalf in Syria’s civil war, saying Tehran has only military advisers on the ground.

Kohavi last month claimed credit for an air strike on a convoy that had entered Syria from Iraq, saying the target had been a truck carrying Iranian weaponry. read more

Reporting by Suleiman Al-Khalidi; Editing by Nick Zieminski and Bradley Perrett

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World

Power outage forces Philippines to suspend flights, shut airspace

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  • More than 280 flights delayed, diverted on New Year’s Day
  • Transportation chief blames power outage for failure
  • System partially restored, airlines offer free rebooking

MANILA, Jan 1 (Reuters) – Philippine authorities halted flights in and out of Manila on New Year’s Day due to a malfunction of air traffic control, which also prevented airlines bound to other destinations from using the country’s airspace.

A total of 282 flights were either delayed, cancelled or diverted to other regional airports, affecting around 56,000 passengers at Manila’s Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA), the airport operator said on Sunday.

It was unclear how many overflights were affected.

Transportation Secretary Jaime Bautista apologized for the inconvenience to passengers as he blamed a power outage for the breakdown of the central air traffic control system that also affected operations at other airports in the country.

He said the outdated existing facility should be upgraded immediately and that a back-up system was also needed.

“This is air traffic management system issue,” he said in a media briefing. “If you will compare us with Singapore, for one, there is a big difference, they are at least 10 years ahead of us.”

As of 0800 GMT, “the system has been partially restored thereby allowing limited flight operations”, the Manila International Airport Authority said in a statement. By late evening, eight flight arrivals and eight departures had been allowed, according to the airport operator.

Video clips and photos posted on social media showed long queues at the airport and airline personnel distributing food packs and drinks to stranded passengers.

“We’re told radar and navigation facilities at NAIA down. I was on my way home fm Tokyo – 3 hours into the flight, but had to return to Haneda,” tweeted one passenger – Manuel Pangilinan, chairman of Philippine telecommunications conglomerate PLDT Inc.

“6 hours of useless flying but inconvenience to travellers and losses to tourism and business are horrendous. Only in the PH. Sigh.”

Budget carrier Cebu Pacific (CEB.PS) and Philippine Airlines (PAL.PS) said they were offering passengers due to fly on Sunday free rebooking or the option to convert tickets to vouchers.

Reporting by Enrico Dela Cruz; Editing by Neil Fullick, Peter Graff and Alison Williams

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World

Hong Kong asks Japan to drop airport bans, 60,000 travellers affected

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HONG KONG, Dec 29 (Reuters) – Hong Kong has asked Japan to withdraw a COVID-19 restriction that allows passenger flights from the financial hub to land only at four designated airports, saying the decision would affect about 60,000 passengers.

India, Italy, Taiwan and the United States require mandatory COVID-19 tests on travellers from China after Beijing’s decision last month to lift stringent zero-COVID policies that fuelled a surge in infections across mainland China.

Hong Kong, home to more than 7 million people, is recording around 20,000 coronavirus cases a day but lifted its COVID curbs on Thursday for the first time in three years.

Japan, a top travel destination for those in Hong Kong, said it would limit flights from Hong Kong, Macau and mainland China to Tokyo’s two airports, as well as Osaka and Nagoya, from Friday.

The decision comes during a peak travel season ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday which begins on Jan. 21.

“It is understood that around 250 outbound flights of Hong Kong airlines will be affected between December 30, 2022 and the end of January 2023, affecting around 60,000 passengers,” the government said in a statement late on Wednesday.

City leader John Lee said the government had indicated to Japan that it was disappointed.

“We think that Hong Kong people should be allowed to use not just these four airports,” Lee said.

On Thursday, Hong Kong’s government said Japan would let passenger flights from Hong Kong also land in Hokkaido, Fukuoka and Okinawa provided that no passengers aboard had been in mainland China for the prior seven days, but said the condition was “unreasonable”.

Flights of Hong Kong airlines can still carry passengers back to Hong Kong from airports in Japan, the government said, to ensure their smooth return and “minimise the impact to Hong Kong travellers caused by the incident.”

In a statement, Hong Kong’s flagship carrier Cathay Pacific Airways (0293.HK) said it would continue to operate flights to Japan, although it would reduce these to 65 a week, down 20% from its planned schedule for Jan 2023.

HK Express, which is owned by Cathay, said in a separate statement it would only be able to operate 60 scheduled flights a week to destinations in Japan due to the curbs, prompting the cancellation of 41 flights from Hong Kong to Japan in January.

Hong Kong Airlines and Peach Aviation said they would cancel some flight routes because of the rules.

In December, China began dismantling the world’s strictest COVID regime of lockdowns and extensive testing, putting its battered economy on course for a complete re-opening next year.

The lifting of curbs following widespread protests has meant that COVID is spreading largely unchecked, probably infecting millions of people each day, some international health experts have said.

Reporting by Farah Master and Twinnie Siu; Editing by Lincoln Feast and Stephen Coates

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World

LATAM Airlines plane crashes on Peruvian runway, two firefighters dead

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LIMA, Nov 18 (Reuters) – A LATAM Airlines (LTM.SN) jet collided with a firetruck on the runway of Peru’s Jorge Chavez International Airport as it was taking off on Friday, the carrier said, resulting in the death of two firefighters.

No passengers or flight crew members were killed in the incident, the airline said.

It remains unclear why the firetruck entered the runway while the plane was taking off and the prosecutors’ office said it was investigating the incident as potential manslaughter.

Video posted on social media showed the jet colliding with the firetruck as it careened down the runway, then rapidly catching fire and smoking heavily as it ground to a halt.

Lima Airport Partners, which operates Jorge Chavez in Lima, the nation’s most important airport, said the airport will remain closed at least through 1 p.m. local time on Saturday.

The flight was LA2213, covering the domestic Lima-Juliaca route, LATAM Airlines said.

This is the second incident in less than a month involving LATAM Airlines, after one of its planes had its nose destroyed during a severe storm that forced it to make an emergency landing.

Reporting by Marco Aquino in Lima, additional reporting by Fabian Cambero in Santiago, Marcelo Rochabrun in Lima and Carolina Pulice in Mexico City; Editing by Anthony Esposito, Rosalba O’Brien and Matthew Lewis

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World

Climate activists block private jet take-offs at Schiphol Airport

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AMSTERDAM, Nov 5 (Reuters) – More than 100 environmental activists wearing white suits stormed into an area where private jets are kept at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport on Saturday and stopped several aircraft from departing by sitting in front of their wheels.

The protest was part of a day of demonstrations in and around the airport organised by environmental groups Greenpeace and Extinction Rebellion to protest over greenhouse gas emissions and other pollution caused by the airport and aviation industry.

No delays to commercial flights were reported as of the early afternoon.

“We want fewer flights, more trains and a ban on unnecessary short-haul flights and private jets,” said Greenpeace Netherlands campaign leader Dewi Zloch.

The environmental group says Schiphol is the largest source of carbon dioxide emissions in the Netherlands, emitting 12 billion kilograms annually.

[1/5] Climate activists protest against environmental pollution from aviation at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport, in Schiphol, Netherlands November 5, 2022. REUTERS/Piroschka van de Wouw

Hundreds of other demonstrators in and around the airport’s main hall carried signs saying “Restrict Aviation” and “More Trains”.

Responding to the protest, Schiphol said it aims to become an emissions-free airport by 2030 and supports targets for the aviation industry to reach net zero emissions by 2050.

Military police tasked with airport security said in a statement they had “made a number of detentions of persons who were on airport property without being allowed”.

The Dutch government announced plans in June for a cap on annual passengers at the airport at 440,000, around 11% below 2019 levels, citing air pollution and climate concerns.

Transportation Minister Mark Harbers told parliament last month his office could not control growing private jet traffic, and the government is considering whether to include the issue in its climate policy.

Reporting by Toby Sterling
Editing by Toby Chopra and Helen Popper

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Business

UK launches aviation charter to address airport disruption

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LONDON, July 17 (Reuters) – The British government launched an “Aviation Passenger Charter” on Sunday to help passengers know their rights if they are faced with problems at airports after the widespread disruption seen this year.

Long queues and cancelled flights caused by staff shortages have caused chaos at times, prompting airlines to cut back their schedules as the industry struggles to keep up with a surge in demand after the COVID-19 pandemic.

The new charter will help passengers know what to do if they are confronted by cancellations, delays or missing baggage, the government said, with guidance on how to complain if they feel they have been treated unfairly.

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“Passengers deserve reliable services, and to be properly compensated if things don’t go to plan, and the chaotic scenes we’ve seen at airports are unacceptable,” transport minister Grant Shapps said.

“The new charter will help to give UK passengers peace of mind as they enjoy the renewed freedom to travel, whether for holidays, business or to visit loved ones.”

Last month, the government published a 22-point support plan to avoid further disruption, including telling airlines to run “realistic” summer schedules and promising to speed up security checks. It said these were now being processed in “record time”.

In a sign of the problems, London’s Heathrow Airport this week asked airlines to stop selling tickets for summer departures and capped the number of passengers flying from Britain’s busiest hub at 100,000 a day. read more

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Reporting by Michael Holden; Editing by Nick Macfie

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US

U.S. drops COVID testing for incoming international air travelers

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WASHINGTON, June 10 (Reuters) – The United States late Friday rescinded a 17-month-old requirement that people arriving in the country by air test negative for COVID-19, a move that follows intense lobbying by airlines and the travel industry.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Rochelle Walensky issued a four-page order lifting the mandate, effective at 12:01 a.m. ET (0400 GMT) Sunday, saying it is “not currently necessary.”

The requirement had been one of the last major U.S. COVID-19 travel requirements. Its end comes as the summer travel season kicks off, and airlines were already preparing for record demand. Airlines have said that many Americans have not been not traveling internationally because of concerns they will test positive and be stranded abroad.

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U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said the CDC decision is based on science and available data, and said the agency “will not hesitate to reinstate a pre-departure testing requirement, if needed later.”

The CDC will reassess the decision in 90 days, an administration official said.

The United States has required incoming international air travelers to provide pre-departure negative tests since January 2021. In December the CDC tightened the rule to require travelers to test negative within one day before flights to the United States rather than three days.

The CDC has not required testing for land border crossings.

Many countries in Europe and elsewhere have already dropped testing requirements.

An American Airlines Boeing 777 plane takes off from Paris Charles de Gaulle airport in Roissy-en-France near Paris, France, December 2, 2021. REUTERS/Sarah Meyssonnier/File Photo

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The CDC is still requiring most non-U.S. citizens to be vaccinated against COVID to travel to the United States.

Two officials told Reuters the Biden administration had considered lifting the testing rule only for vaccinated travelers.

JetBlue Airways (JBLU.O) Chief Executive Robin Hayes told Reuters on Friday that the testing requirement was “the last obstacle to a really full international travel recovery,” saying that it “served no purpose anymore.”

IATA, the world’s biggest airline trade group, said it was “great news” that the administration is “removing the ineffective pre-departure COVID test for travel to the US.”

In April, a federal judge declared the CDC’s requirements that travelers wear masks on airplanes and in transit hubs like airports unlawful and the Biden administration stopped enforcing it. The Justice Department has appealed the order, but no decision is likely before fall at the earliest.

The CDC continues to recommend travelers wear masks and get COVID-19 tests before and after international flights.

Raymond James said in a research note that lifting the restrictions “is an important catalyst for international travel.”

Delta Air Lines (DAL.N) Chief Executive Ed Bastian told Reuters last week that dropping the requirements will boost travel, noting that 44 of 50 countries Delta serves do not require testing.

U.S. Travel Association CEO Roger Dow said Friday’s move will “accelerate the recovery of the U.S. travel industry,” which was hard hit by the pandemic.

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Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Leslie Adler

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