Associated Press- September 17, 2003 - PARIS
Employees at the French news agency Agence France-Presse began a 24-hour strike Wednesday to protest a management plan to sell and lease back their headquarters in central Paris. The sale price of the building, $55.7 million, would enable AFP to pay off part of its $72 million four-year deficit for 2000-2003.
AFP's board of directors met Wednesday afternoon to consider the proposal to sell the building to a consortium of insurers for 12 to 18 years. Under the plan, AFP would occupy the building during that period and then repurchase it.
The board decided to postpone consideration of the plan -- which aims to help pay off the agency's deficit -- until Oct. 8. Employees said they opposed the sale/lease-back deal out of fear the company would not have the money to buy back the building, where AFP has been since shortly after the end of World War II.
The strike was observed by editorial and non-editorial workers in France and some other countries where AFP has bureaus, Sharp said. It began at 1 p.m. AFP has more than 2,000 employees, 900 of them working outside France. The agency is present in 165 countries, and has 110 bureaus.
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