South Korea appeared determined yesterday to quickly end a strike by unionized pilots at Korean Air Co, the nation's largest airline and the world's biggest air-cargo carrier.
Minister of Construction and Transport Choo Byung-jik said that he would ask Labor Minister Kim Dae-hwan later yesterday to invoke the government's special powers to end the walkout, which began early yesterday.
Unionized pilots at Korean Air's smaller rival, Asiana Airlines Inc, staged a 25-day strike that ended on Aug. 10. The government ultimately used its special powers to intervene and ended the walkout -- a step used for industries considered critical to the national economy.
Choo's comment shows that the government is unlikely to wait that long to end the strike at Korean Air, where a work stoppage was certain to cause problems for South Koreans traveling overseas ahead of the year-end holidays, and could hurt the country's exports -- a key source of economic growth.
According to a Korean Air estimate, about 70 percent of the carrier's operations will have to be suspended due to the strike.
Korean Air said yesterday that it canceled a total of 204 passenger and cargo flights on the first day of the walkout, suspending about 53 percent of scheduled flights.
That included 30 international passenger flights, 150 domestic passenger flights and 24 cargo flights, the company said.
The airline's canceled overseas passenger destinations include Tokyo, Los Angeles, Dallas, Beijing and Shanghai and San Francisco, among others.
Korean Air expects to incur losses and additional expenses of 25.3 billion won (US$24.4 million) a day.
Park Byung-ryul, the union's spokesman, said 1,344 of the airline's 1,980 pilots belong to the union. He said about 500 union members had gathered together near Incheon International Airport near Seoul.
He also said it would take several days before the union would know how many members would decide to join the walkout.
The union is demanding an 8 percent hike in annual wages, while the airline has offered a 3 percent increase, the company and union said on Wednesday.
Korean Air said the union's demands are unacceptable considering high fuel costs and the unfavorable business environment facing the airline.
Last year, captains earned an average of 120 million won in annual pay, according to the airline. First officers earned 88 million won.
The airline's extensive overseas passenger destinations include Chicago, London, New York, Moscow, Istanbul, Los Angeles, Vladivostok, Tokyo, Toronto, Honolulu and Sydney.
The US government has signed defense cooperation agreements with Japan and the Philippines to boost the deterrence capabilities of countries in the first island chain, a report by the National Security Bureau (NSB) showed. The main countries on the first island chain include the two nations and Taiwan. The bureau is to present the report at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee tomorrow. The US military has deployed Typhon missile systems to Japan’s Yamaguchi Prefecture and Zambales province in the Philippines during their joint military exercises. It has also installed NMESIS anti-ship systems in Japan’s Okinawa
‘WIN-WIN’: The Philippines, and central and eastern European countries are important potential drone cooperation partners, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung said Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) in an interview published yesterday confirmed that there are joint ventures between Taiwan and Poland in the drone industry. Lin made the remark in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper). The government-backed Taiwan Excellence Drone International Business Opportunities Alliance and the Polish Chamber of Unmanned Systems on Wednesday last week signed a memorandum of understanding in Poland to develop a “non-China” supply chain for drones and work together on key technologies. Asked if Taiwan prioritized Poland among central and eastern European countries in drone collaboration, Lin
NO CONFIDENCE MOTION? The premier said that being toppled by the legislature for defending the Constitution would be a democratic badge of honor for him Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday announced that the Cabinet would not countersign the amendments to the local revenue-sharing law passed by the Legislative Yuan last month. Cho said the decision not to countersign the amendments to the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法) was made in accordance with the Constitution. “The decision aims to safeguard our Constitution,” he said. The Constitution stipulates the president shall, in accordance with law, promulgate laws and issue mandates with the countersignature of the head of the Executive Yuan, or with the countersignatures of both the head of the Executive Yuan and ministers or
CABINET APPROVAL: People seeking assisted reproduction must be assessed to determine whether they would be adequate parents, the planned changes say Proposed amendments to the Assisted Reproduction Act (人工生殖法) advanced yesterday by the Executive Yuan would grant married lesbian couples and single women access to legal assisted reproductive services. The proposed revisions are “based on the fundamental principle of respecting women’s reproductive autonomy,” Cabinet spokesperson Michelle Lee (李慧芝) quoted Vice Premier Cheng Li-chiun (鄭麗君), who presided over a Cabinet meeting earlier yesterday, as saying at the briefing. The draft amendment would be submitted to the legislature for review. The Ministry of Health and Welfare, which proposed the amendments, said that experts on children’s rights, gender equality, law and medicine attended cross-disciplinary meetings, adding that
RSS