Miners of the zinc, lead and silver Trepca mining complex in Kosovo are protesting after not being paid for January.
Through a Facebook post, the Union of Trepca miners announced that a strike started on Thursday.
“In the last two months there has been a record production since the post-war period in this mine,” miners’ union wrote.
This is not the first time Trepca’s miners protest demanding their salaries.
Hundreds protested at their workplace in November last year, until the Ministry of Economy and Environment confirmed the salaries for October will be paid.
Government of Kosovo allocated €1.1 million to the Trepca mine in November, to help it overcome financial issues due to accumulated debts.
The zinc, lead and silver mining complex located in the northern city of Mitrovica used to have over 23 thousand employees before the dissolution of Yugoslavia, but only about 1200 now.
Following the Kosovo in 1999, the mines remained in ethnically divided territory, Serb workers in the northern part of the city and Albanian in south. This pushed the company close to bankruptcy.
In 2016, Kosovo’s parliament transformed Trepça into a public company with 80 percent of shares owned by the government and 20 percent by miners. Kosovo Serbs claim managing rights over the mine.
