Spain promised "zero tolerance" for violence by striking truckers after police cleared picket lines blocking highways during a fuel protest. The government said deliveries of food and other goods were returning to normal on Thursday after an agreement with most of the strikers on Wednesday although food distribution centres reported shortages and car factories remained at a standstill.
"The government is going to have zero tolerance for any act of intimidation or violence," said Socialist Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, after incidents including an arson attack on a strike-breaking truck that left the driver with burns to 25 percent of his body.
The government said it had arrested 71 picketers for offences including intimidating non-striking drivers since the stoppage by 75,000 truckers began on Sunday night to call for government help to cope with high fuel prices. The government, re-elected in March, tempted most truckers back to work with promises of tax breaks on Wednesday but has refused to accede to demands for minimum haulage charges.
Tax breaks were also offered by Portugal, which also negotiated an end to a truck strike on Wednesday. However the scene at Madrid's main food market, Mercamadrid, which supplies the capital's shops and supermarkets, was far from normal on Thursday as the number of deliveries was reduced to a trickle because non-striking truckers were still being stopped by picketers. Car plants were also at a standstill, due to a shortage of parts caused by the strike, national car makers' association Anfac said.