French trade unions called a rail strike on Wednesday to protest plans to reform public sector pension benefits, in the first major show of union power since the election of President Nicolas Sarkozy in May.
The call by five unions for strikes on October 17 has echoes of 1995, when striking rail workers crippled the country in a protest about pension reform.
Sarkozy said this week that he wanted his government "to reform without delay" the special benefits for public sector workers.
He promised that the so-called "special regimes" -- which allow state rail and power employees and some other categories of worker to retire early and on higher pensions -- would be reformed in the next "few months."
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