Grupo Mexico Can Fire Striking Miners Says Government

Mexican miners on strike for nearly two years at the country's largest copper pit can be fired, a government labour board ruled Wednesday, prompting angry workers to surround the mine in protest.
The ruling is a win for the mine's owner, Grupo Mexico, which argued it could no longer operate the massive Cananea deposit because machinery left idle for months had been looted and was damaged beyond repair.
Workers at Cananea laid down tools in July 2007 in a dispute that began over health and safety standards but has since been complicated by a personal feud between the company and the union's leaders.
"The company declared force majeure," the labour board statement issued in the early morning hours after 14 hours of deliberations.
"At Cananea, there are damages and destruction to machinery, materials, installations and equipment essential to the operation, so serious that the necessary consequence is the termination of contracts," the statement said.
Grupo Mexico said at a news conference Wednesday it will cost millions of dollars to repair the mine, but that it was committed to reopening the installations.
A spokesman for the miners' union disputed the company's claim and said at a news conference that the damage was due to the management's neglect of the installation that put workers health and safety at risk.
The labour board ordered the company to compensate the 1,500 striking workers with three months pay plus 12 days of salary for each year worked at the mine. Workers there earn on average between $770 and $920 a month, the company said.
The union, which has argued in an ongoing court battle that the company is not allowed to fire legally striking workers, pledged to appeal the board's decision.
Miners blocked Cananea's front gate in northern Mexico in protest and the union said federal police sent hundreds of officers to the city in response.
Grupo Mexico's push to close the mine and fire workers has angered the national union, which counts among its members thousands of miners and metalworkers around the country.
A blockade by some 1,000 workers in support of the Cananea workers shuttered a major Mexican port for the past two days, holding up hundreds of containers of imports and exports.
The union said the blockade would continue indefinitely until the case resolved satisfactorily.
Massive losers
Cananea produced more than 400 million pounds of copper a year when operational, which at an average price of $2 a pound means $800m in lost annual revenue, said Daniel Chavez, the company's director of operations, although copper production at Cananea was not included in the company's 2009 earnings guidance.
If reopened, Cananea contains enough ore to produce copper for 65 years, Chavez said.
Two smaller Grupo Mexico mines have been on strike for the same amount of time as Cananea and the company has promised to close those worksites as well.
This is not the first time Grupo Mexico and the miners union have clashed.
Grupo Mexico's second largest copper mine, La Caridad, was shuttered for months in 2006 by a strike that ended when the company fired all the workers and rehired most under a new contract.
One man died in a skirmish between two rival groups of miners outside La Caridad mine in 2007.
Labour Minister Javier Lozano ruled out using police or soldiers to reopen the port or to force miners to leave Cananea, where strikers are taking turns to guard the entrance to the mine and prevent its reopening.
"We have not considered any eviction or any use of force," Lozano told reporters. He said the labour board decision "is a legal ruling and no more."