Four-Hour Strike Hits Airbus France Production

French unions say French and German plants should be treated equally.

Striking workers disrupted production at Airbus factories in France for four hours on Thursday in a dispute over restructuring, unions said.

The strike was called after Airbus, owned by European aerospace group EADS, dropped plans to sell some of its factories in Germany to an outside investor but pressed ahead with plans to sell two of its three factories in France.

French unions say French and German plants should be treated equally.

"Certain sites are completely blocked. At others we have only set up check-point barriers and the employees are free to enter the factories," said Marina Lensky, senior delegate of the CFTC union.

Airbus declined comment.

"We will let the strike speak for itself," said Jacques Rocca, director of communication at Airbus France.

The four-hour strike started at 7:30 a.m. (0530 GMT) and was backed by five major unions.

Output was disrupted at Airbus headquarters in Toulouse as well as the two plants due to be sold to aerospace supplier Latecoere, St Nazaire-Ville in western France and Meaulte in northern France.

Airbus, the world's largest jetliner producer ahead of its only rival Boeing, is cutting jobs and selling factories to cut costs in the face of a weak dollar and to raise outside investment in new composite materials.

Parent company EADS said on Sunday it would hive off three German factories -- Varel, Nordenham and Augsburg -- into an EADS-owned subsidiary after failing to sell them to the preferred buyer MT Aerospace, part of OHB.