1.
SVs & CUs Soup kitchen is striking textile mill. (4 SHOTS)
0.21

2.
SV EXTERIOR OF Soup kitchen with people outside eating noodles. (2 SHOTS)
0.45

3.
SVs Market scene -- people selling sweets. (4 SHOTS)
1.05

4.
GV Beggar.
1.14

5.
GV Woman trying to sell goods on street.
1.26

6.
CU PULL BACK TO GV Musician playing in street with crowd.
1.35

7.
GV Market place with signs showing prices, market scenes - fruit and meat. (4 SHOTS)
1.54

8.
SV Interview with union leader Rodolfo Seguel. (Spanish SOT).
2.25




Initials PW/JRS





Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: A wave of closures and strikes in Chile's industry and copper mines has caused great hardship to workers and their families. The economic crisis brought on by President Augusto Pinochet's experiment in free-market economics led to 30 per cent unemployment and massive foreign loans. Trade unions recently set up soup kitchens to alleviate hardship in numerous factories, including this textile mill. Beggars proliferate and the poor try to meet their minimal needs by selling objects to people in the streets. Inflation has rocketed by 25 per cent this year and some basic food prices have increased by fifty per cent. Leader of the Copper Workers Union Rodolfo Seguel explained in an interview that he called off a day of protest planned for May 11 to avoid a confrontation with the military after it reportedly posted tanks, helicopters and machine guns at the mines.