Hyundai Motor workers leave their factory early after staging a partial walkout in Ulsan.[Yonhap News Photo]
Workers at South Korea's largest carmaker Hyundai Motor launched a four-hour strike Tuesday after the company refused to accept demands for a wage increase, bigger bonus payment and other benefits.
Hyundai Motor's 43,700 union members have endorsed a four-day partial walkout and no extra work. The company estimated Monday's partial strike would cost about 40 billion won (35 million US dollars) in lost production.
Hyundai Motor workers, known for their militant union activities every year, want a 7.2 percent hike in basic salaries, 30 percent of last year's net profit estimated at 6.5 trillion won as bonus, among other things.
The Hyundai Motor group, including Kia Motors, is the world's fifth-largest carmaker. Kia's 34,000-member union has also called for a walkout.
Hyundai Motor workers will state a joint rally Tuesday with workers from Hyundai Heavy Industries, the world's largest shipyard in the southeastern industrial city of Ulsan.
Shipyard unions have opposed a government-initiated labor reform package and what they called "unilateral layoffs".
South Korea's top three shipyards are under sweeping restructuring led by creditor banks which have struggled to rehabilitate the embattled shipbuilding industry through the sale of non-core assets and a cut in jobs.
The union of Samsung Heavy Industries has vowed to down tools on June 28, and workers at Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering have voted for a strike.
Aju News Lim Chang-won = cwlim34@ajunews.com
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