French truckers protest gas prices

Truckers, taxi drivers and farmers staged numerous go-slows on major French highways this week to put pressure on the government over fuel costs.

Some 150 slow-moving lorries snarled traffic leading to Paris's Roissy airport, causing 25-km of tailbacks. "We demonstrate to show that the mobilisation by the truck drivers goes on despite what Transport Secretary of State Dominique Bussereau said this morning."

One truck driver, Severine Duchaussoy, said solutions should be found. She said many trucks companies could close because of the high fuel prices.  "We want to express our anger because we have to find a solution because it's a trap and everybody will have to close down their business," she said.

 A similar protest by more than a hundred truckers brought chaos to the ring road around the southern city of Toulouse, causing major traffic jams in both directions.

Around 60 trucks and ambulances also targeted the main road connecting the western cities of Poitiers and La Rochelle. Further north, taxi drivers blocked a highway leading into the city of Brest in Brittany.

Protests were also reported in the eastern city of Metz and in a number of towns close to the Pyrenees in the far south, A number of ports, including Dieppe on the Channel coast, remained blocked by a hardcore of fishermen seeking more government aid.

The government is due to hold talks with the various parties on June 10 and in the run up to that meeting, ministers are seeing agriculture, haulage and fishing representatives individually.