For a brief moment these past weeks, it appeared that France’s once-mighty unions had lost their clout. Rail workers, once synonymous with crippling strikes, staged a walkout that went largely unnoticed as travellers shrugged, turning to buses and ride-sharing instead. But over at Air France, that well-oiled worker conflict played out in a decidedly more retro fashion. Late Friday, a visibly shaken CE Jean-Marc Janaillac threw in the towel, resigning from a post he held for less than 2 years after failing to win backing from employees for his pay proposals. Calling the labour conflict a “huge waste,” the CE said the only beneficiaries are rivals that have managed to move beyond the endless cycle of strikes that have dominated the European aviation industry in recent years. <br/>
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The French finance minister Sunday raised the pressure on Air France managers and unions to resolve a stand-off over wages, saying the govt would not ride to the carrier's rescue as it grapples with worker strikes and a leadership vacuum. The dispute at Air France-KLM's French arm intensified Friday when staff rejected a pay deal, prompting the group's CE to resign. Finance minister Bruno Le Maire urged the company and workers to resume talks, delivering a blunt assessment of the airline's future as he warned the state's 14% Air France-KLM stake was no guarantee it would pick up the pieces. "If Air France does not make efforts to become more competitive, allowing this flagship to be at the same level at Lufthansa and other airline companies, Air France will disappear," Le Maire said. <br/>
Hundreds of Korean Air workers wearing masks protested in the centre of Seoul late Friday, demanding the ouster of the airline’s chairman, Cho Yang-ho, over the behaviour of two of his daughters who held senior posts at the company. One of the sisters, Cho Hyun-ah, became notorious for a “nut rage” incident on one of the airline’s planes that saw her briefly jailed. The other, Cho Hyun-min, ignited fresh outrage last month, when she was accused of throwing a drink over an advertising executive at a business meeting. In a country where workers are often expected to show unquestioning loyalty, their cases have become a focus of public impatience with the family-run conglomerates known as chaebol that dominate South Korea’s economy, and over what some people see as unchecked bad behaviour by the rich and powerful. <br/>