High energy costs are causing instability in parts of Europe, with Spain sending more than 23,000 police officers on Friday to deal with a truckers’ strike and farmers in France and Greece causing traffic jams with their protests.
Russia’s war in Ukraine has pushed up oil and natural gas prices throughout Europe, causing record inflation and making it more difficult for farmers and truckers to fuel their equipment and trucks, buy fertilizer, and keep up with other expenses. The war exacerbated an energy supply shortage in Europe, which is reliant on Russian oil and natural gas. The shortage has been driving up costs for individuals and businesses for months.
A handful of primarily self-employed Spanish truckers went on strike over high gasoline prices and other grievances a few days ago, and the strike has escalated into violence as most drivers continue to work. On the fifth day of the strike, police in patrol cars and helicopters escorted convoys of trucks along highways and held back picketers, hoping to keep supplies like dairy and cement moving while several sectors reported supply shortages.
Picketers hurled flaming tires across a motorway in northwest Spain overnight, according to national media. According to the Interior Ministry, six persons have been arrested and 34 more are being investigated. Striking truckers have also been accused of throwing rocks at working trucks this week, ripping cargo tarps, puncturing truck tires, and threatening drivers with violence.
A convoy of approximately 20 farmers on their tractors protested Friday in the western Brittany area of France, which has seen isolated rallies this week against skyrocketing fuel costs. They drove slowly down a highway and blocked a traffic circle, generating tailbacks to attract attention to their predicament.
In recent days, French road truckers and fishing employees have put up makeshift barriers, blocking roads with their cars and burning palettes.
Truckers honked their horns in protest of high fuel prices as they passed through Berlin and other German towns on Friday.
Meanwhile, hundreds of farmers protested in central Athens, blocking traffic and demanding that the government provide them further concessions to help them cope with rising energy bills. Protesters gathered outside the Farm Ministry, some on tractors, holding vegetables and black flags, with plans to march to parliament in the capital’s center.
The administration in Spain has reiterated its claims that far-right sympathizers are instigating the strike. The walkout, according to Finance Minister Mara Jess Montero, amounts to “extortion, which the far-right is exploiting to prevent produce and food from being delivered.”
The striking truckers deny any ties to the far-right. They said the government is “seeking to criminalize and attach ideological labels on a sector that merely wants to live from its job and feels excluded and insulted by the country’s authorities” in a statement posted late Thursday on their website.
The strike, according to the Platform for the Defense of the Road Transport Sector, began spontaneously in 2008. According to its website, it was founded by six truckers in Spain’s northwest Galicia region who were dissatisfied with national trucking associations.
The organization is not associated with any of the larger national trucking groups or road haulage corporations, and it does not participate in the sector’s government negotiations. When asked how many members the group had, the group did not immediately react.
However, the strike is flexing the self-employed truckers’ economic strength, and they’re using it to compel the government to cave into their demands on a variety of topics. Cement, mining, and dairy companies are among those warning that their inventories are running short or that they are having difficulty delivering their products.
“Food and basic services provision is not a small concern,” stated Farm Minister Luis Planas. “This is a constitutional problem involving freedom of movement.”
The self-employed truckers claim that the pay they receive for hauling loads does not cover their expenses, which have risen as a result of increased gasoline prices. They also say that huge distribution corporations engage in unfair competition by driving down freight charges and demanding better working conditions, including retirement at the age of 60.
The Spanish government says it will take action against high energy and gasoline costs later this month, similar to what other European countries have done as energy prices drive up consumer prices.
The disturbance comes as the prime ministers of Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Greece convened on Friday to demand an immediate European Union-wide solution to the energy issue at the European Council meeting in Brussels next week.
Spain’s government has stated that it will wait to see what Europe can agree on before taking further action on energy costs.
