ATHENS – Greece’s Transport Minister Kostas Karamanlis said he’ll act to make sure some public transportation systems remain open during strikes after they were shut down when workers joined a general work stoppage in the nation’s capital Feb. 18.

He didn’t say how he could force workers not to strike but added that disciplinary action will be taken again union members with the privatized TrainOSE rail company who occupied a station to prevent trains from operating.

That stranded commuters and infuriated the New Democracy government which had been told by company officials there wouldn’t be any disruptions on that service during the strike that involved the country’s public workers union.
“We want to send a clear message that no small group of people can hold hostage colleagues who want to work and, more importantly, people waiting to use the Proastiakos,” Karamanlis told SKAI.

Buses, trolleys, trams, the metro and electric railway shut down as part of the action called by the umbrella civil servant’s union ADEDY against a New Democracy government social security bill, the latest in hundreds of protests over the last decade against austerity measures that failed to make governments pull back most measures, this one aimed at a social security contribution bill.