Spaniards pour into streets during strike

Hundreds of thousands of protesters swamped Spain's streets on Thursday to back a general strike, marred by clashes in Barcelona where youths set fire to a two-storey Starbucks. Unions said nearly a million people took part in Madrid alone to decry labour reforms, spending cuts and soaring unemployment in a country plunging into recession. Demonstrations, overwhelmingly peaceful in most of the country, erupted in violence in a central portion of the northeastern city of Barcelona. Scuffles also broke out earlier in Madrid. Police shot smoke cannisters and fired rubber bullets into the ground so they would ricochet into people's legs in Barcelona, television pictures showed, as a rubbish container burned in a city street. One group was "provoking confrontations and violent incidents," said a Catalan interior ministry spokesman. "They burned a two-storey Starbucks cafe and another shop. It is out now. In the shop there is broken glass and they took out whatever they could burn." Many rubbish containers were also set alight, police said. A spokesman for the Catalan government, Francesc Homs, said a minority had taken advantage of the protest. "I don't think this is linked in any way to the unions," he said. It was the first national strike to challenge Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, who was sworn in 100 days ago vowing to cut Spain's 23-percent unemployment rate and fix its faltering finances. The strike came a day before the conservative government adopts a 2012 budget set to axe tens of billions of euros in spending, adding to cuts that have already squeezed public services. Spain's major CCOO and UGT unions called the strike over the government's February 11 labour reform which makes it cheaper to lay off staff and easier to cut salaries. Minimum service agreements kept schools and hospitals open, ensuring 30 percent of trains and buses ran, and allowed some planes to fly despite Iberia, Air Nostrum and Vueling cancelling two-thirds of flights. Unions claimed a big turnout especially in factories, but interior ministry policy chief Cristina Diaz said fewer people took part than in the last general strike in September 2010. Across Spain, police arrested 176 people while 58 police and 46 civilians were injured, she said. In one incident a policeman hit a protester with his baton, cutting him above the eyebrow as he and others tried to stop buses leaving a station in southern Madrid, an AFP photographer said. In Barcelona police said 21 people were arrested. At a union rally in central Madrid, 56-year-old civil service worker Angel Escolar said the labour reform removed basic workers' rights. "They can change your hours, change your shifts, cut your salary and lay off people without justifying it. They are going to throw us out and hire young people for less and with worse conditions," he said. Many commuters still crowded train stations and bus stops, saying they could not afford to lose a day's pay. "I can understand why they strike. The reform is just to fire people more easily and more cheaply," said underground commuter Pedro Moreno, 32, who works at a supermarket. "But this is not the time to lose work days. I am lucky to have a job," he added. The strike came as Spain sought to show Europe it will fulfill its promises to cut spending and trim the public deficit to 5.3 percent of economic output this year from 8.51 percent last year. The government has already announced budget cuts and tax hikes totalling 15 billion euros but analysts say Spain needs to shave 50 billion euros from the budget. CCOO general secretary Ignacio Fernandez Toxo warned of a new show of force on May 1. "If they don't go back on the reform there will be a growing social conflict until they fix it," he said.