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Athens - A general strike Wednesday brought Greece to a standstill as hundreds of thousands walked out of their jobs paralysing air, rail and maritime services to protest a new wave of debt-slashing measures.
The strike, the seventh this year, came as the ruling Socialists pushed through additional reforms under a tough economy overhaul mandated by the European Union and the International Monetary Fund in return for a lifebelt.
Earlier Wednesday, the government secured parliamentary approval of salary cuts in the country's badly mismanaged public utilities but was forced to axe a dissenting lawmaker, reducing its majority in the chamber to six.
In addition to grounding planes and paralysing rail and ferries, the strike also shut down schools, courts, banks and pharmacies while hospitals ran on reduced staff.
Civil engineers, journalists and lawyers also joined the action.
For a third straight day after previous action by disgruntled transport workers, Athens witnessed giant traffic jams as even taxi drivers prepared to stage a work stoppage in support of the strike.
Separate union demonstrations are expected later in the day.
Prime Minister George Papandreou late on Tuesday called a crunch cabinet meeting to discuss privatisation and "better coordination" in the use of state properties.
"We have tough decisions ahead of us, but it is only through bold strokes that we can overcome the difficulties," Papandreou told his ministers late on Tuesday ahead of the parliamentary vote.
Hours later, the government majority approved salary cuts for staff at utilities, known as Deko's in Greece, who earn more than €1 800 ($2 413) a month.
The finance ministry had recently released figures showing that Deko staff were paid some €40 000 on average, far more than other public or private-sector employees.
This was despite the fact that most of the public utilities were deep in debt.
Greece is trapped under a debt mountain of over €300bn ($402bn) and came near bankruptcy in May before it was rescued by a loan from the European Union, the European Central Bank and the IMF.
The government in November announced a plan to reduce the deficit of loss-making state enterprises by €800m ($1bn).
The adoption of such reforms follows a first round of austerity measures aimed at reducing the Greek public deficit, which stood at over 15.4% of output last year, more than five times the EU ceiling.
The economy overhaul is a condition set by the European Union and the International Monetary Fund for the release of a €15bn installment from the €110bn EU-IMF rescue package accorded Greece in May.
Athens is now hoping in exchange to get an extension to repaying this EU-IMF loan in order to avoid facing an impossible mission to settle it among other debts that expire in 2015.
On Tuesday, unions brought hundreds of protesters outside the Greek parliament, carrying banners that read "Strike until final victory".
"We cannot take any more (austerity)" read another banner.
Several hundred police officers and coastguards, whose wages were targeted in a previous wave of cuts, staged a separate demonstration later in the day.
"Your profits cost human lives," read a banner held up by uniformed security staff, some of them standing under a crossed-out emblem of the IMF.
