Strike-hit France dips into fuel reserves

France today said it has dipped into its strategic oil reserves due to blockades at refineries as power workers threatened to join gathering protests against a labour law reform.
Police fired water cannon to disperse activists blocking an oil depot in the northeast, but six out of eight of France's refineries were still either at a standstill or had sharply reduced their output.
The head of the oil industry federation (Ufip) said that with a fifth of petrol pumps running dry, it had begun using strategic reserves.
"For the past two days, since there have been operational problems at the refineries and blockades of depots, we have... been using reserve supplies," Francis Duseux told French radio.

France has nearly four months of fuel reserves, but the announcement that they are already being tapped heaps further pressure on President Francois Hollande's deeply unpopular Socialist government.
The CGT union, locked in an increasingly bitter struggle with the government, has threatened to extend its action to nuclear power stations tomorrow.

It has urged "the biggest action possible" on a day when unions have called for a broad day of strikes and demonstrations across the country.
One nuclear power plant in Nogent-sur-Seine, around 100 kilometres southeast of Paris, is already operating at reduced capacity.
One of the two reactors has been out of operation since Tuesday "due to a technical problem" and "we will ensure that it is not re-started", said Arnaud Pacot, the local CGT representative.

Authorities stepped up their action to try to ensure the blockades of refineries and fuel depots do not paralyse France with just over two weeks to go before it hosts the Euro 2016 football championships.
Riot police used force to break a blockade at an oil depot in Douchy-les-Mines near the Belgian border that had been in place since Thursday.
Watched by around 80 striking workers, firefighters extinguished burning tyres that were blocking roads, sending thick plumes of smoke billowing into the air.