World briefs

Daft Honours

Queen's Birthday honours this year included a former Coca-Cola executive involved in controversy over deaths of union officials in Colombia.

Douglas Daft, who now heads another fiercely anti union company Wal-Mart, received the companion of the Order of Australia for global business leadership.

The award has raised eyebrows in the US where corporate affairs activists point out the Daft resisted an inquiry into company involvement in the suppression of trade union rights in Colombia bottling plants and in the murders of Colombian trade union officials.

Colombian unions took Coca Cola to court in Florida in 2001 alleging the company had contracted para military death squads to torture, kidnap and murder union leaders. Court action continues.

French Protest

Hundreds of striking French ferry workers set fire to cars and pelted police with pieces of metal and distress flares at the port of Marseille in May, Lloyds List reports.

The protests were part of a dispute over reform of the French shipping registry.

Workers from the state-owned Corsica-Mediterranean National Company (SNCM), which operates ferries to Corsica and North Africa, blockaded the port the port with tractors and loading-vehicles.

Strikers turned water cannon on the police before an agreement to end the violence was reached Unions say the government changes to the rules for registering shipping under a French flag will lead to low-paid foreigners taking over French jobs.