PARIS, July 17 (RIA Novosti) - A U.S. construction equipment maker has agreed to pay over $40,000 in extra compensation to redundant workers at a plant in southwest France, after they threatened to blow up equipment, the factory's labor union said.
The 53 workers at the JLG Industries branch in Tonneins, which produces platforms for cranes, brought six cranes into the factory car park on Wednesday, surrounded them with gas canisters and kindle, and threatened to blow them up if no compensation deal was reached.
At talks between company officials and the striking workers, which ran late into the night on Thursday, the company gave in to compensation demands.
"We were proposing compensation of 30,000 euros [42,000 dollars] above the legal minimum, for the 53 people who are going to lose their jobs," the AFP news agency quoted Christian Amadio, head of the works council at the factory, as saying on Friday.
The incident was the third explosion threat by striking French workers this month.
Workers at New Fabris, whose main clients are Renault and PSA Citroen, demanded an extra payout last week, but no deal has yet been reached.
The telecommunication company's Nortel employees also threatened to blow up their plant with gas canisters unless they received 100,000 euros ($141,000) in compensation, but soon removed the canisters. Negotiations are ongoing.
