Flights were cancelled at Zagreb airport from 1100 to 1600 hours on Friday due to a strike launched by four trade unions in a bid to persuade the airport management to sign a new collective agreement.
Trade unionists also demanded the resignation of the airport director Tonci Peovic.
At noon, the striking workers held a rally at which the spokesman for the coordinating body of the four trade unions active at Zagreb Airport, Ante Dujic, said that the new collective agreement should safeguard the workers's rights after the airport was taken over by a new possible concession-holder.
He refused the management's claims that the trade unions demand more rights which would cost an additional 17 million kuna.
Dujic also requested Peovic's resignation.
Peovic told the press that during the negotiations the management had accepted 19 demands from the trade unions and that the management acceded to the trade unions' demand to secure the rights for all employees after the airport was assumed by a new concession-holder. He said that the future concession-holder would be bound to keep all workers on the payroll in the next five years.
However, the management found it unacceptable that the trade unions insist on being included in the process of adopting rules, whereby the unions would be given a right of veto to all internal regulations.
Eight flights were cancelled due to the strike.
The management and the trade unions are expected to continue negotiations later in the day and over the weekend. If the negotiations end in failure, the workers will go on a day-long strike on Monday.
