Freight drivers and farmers paralysed fuel distribution across France yesterday, blockading oil refineries and storage depots. It was the second wave of strikes within days over spiralling prices.
Watched at a distance by police who refused to intervene, protesters sealed off around 60 out of the country's 70 main oil installations, manoeuvring lorries and farm vehicles to prevent fuel tankers entering or leaving.
The most important oil plants in France were among those hit, including depots at Fos-sur-Mer near Marseille, at Donges on the Atlantic coast near La Rochelle, at Le Havre and Dunkirk on the northern coast and at Grandpuits east of Paris.
The main freight-transport federation, the FNTR, said only oil storage and processing plants would initially be affected, and as there were sufficient stocks to last several days ordinary motorists would not suffer.
However, in some places queues of cars formed outside petrol stations in a bid to beat eventual shortages. A spokesman for oil company Total Fina Elf said: "In some areas some stations are out of certain products."
The Transport Minister, Mr Jean-Claude Gayssot, held meetings with the three business groups representing the haulage industry, the FNTR, UNOSTRA and TLF, amid indications that the government was preparing to offer a package of measures. The talks broke up in the afternoon with no announcement.
Hauliers say that because of the steep rise in world oil prices, their fuel costs have gone up 40 per cent over the last year, and that unless French fuel taxes are cut to compensate, many of them will be driven out of business.
"We are paying at the same time extremely high prices and the second biggest level of taxation on fuel in Europe. We can't keep doing both," said Mr JeanPaul Deneuville, FNTR's delegate-general.
Farmers joined the hauliers' protests, complaining of similar problems. Mr Guy Petain, of the union FDSEA, said they were demanding the end of a special fuel tax, and lower social charges. "We won't budge till we get what we want," he said.
Taxi drivers, who have announced a day of action for Thursday, as well as owners of private ambulances and bus companies, also said they supported the action and in some cases joined in.
The action came three days after French fishermen won major concessions from the government at the end of a blockade of French ports, and truckers' spokesmen were adamant they would continue until they had received similar compensation.
Commentators said that having given way to the fishermen, the socialist Prime Minister, Mr Lionel Jospin, was in no position to resist for long the demands of the hauliers.
On Sunday, Mr Jospin told a Socialist Party meeting that the government was "ready to take specific measures for the sectors in most difficulty" as a result of the oil price rise, and specifically mentioned road hauliers.
The French trucking industry has lurched from crisis to crisis in the last years, hit by mounting costs and growing competition from the rest of Europe.
Strike action by drivers' unions brought chaos to the road network three times in the last four years, drawing demands for compensation from France's European neighbours and threats of legal action by the EU against the government for failing to ensure the free movement of traffic.
Three more cases of BSE have been discovered in cattle in France, bringing the year's total to 43, the French Ministry of Agriculture said yesterday.
Two cows were found with the disease in herds in of Aube, east of Paris, and Aveyron in the south. All other animals in the herds were slaughtered in line with regulations.