Air France cabin crew members to continue strike

By Jean-Baptiste Vey and Sudip Kar-Gupta

PARIS (Reuters) - Travellers at Paris airports faced more misery over the weekend as Air France (AIRF.PA) cabin crews vowed to continue to strike over pay and working conditions.

The strike has caused chaos, with many French families preparing to leave for school half-term holidays.

The situation became serious enough for the government to intervene on Saturday, saying it wanted the airline to reach an agreement with the protesting workers as soon as possible.

"Without wishing to intervene in this dispute which is an internal Air France matter, Transport Minister Dominique Bussereau wishes to express the government's desire for negotiations between Air France management and the unions to conclude with an agreement as soon as possible," a spokeswoman for Bussereau said.

The Air France dispute comes after railway workers went on strike earlier this month to protest against plans by President Nicolas Sarkozy to reform pension privileges enjoyed by many of them.

The rail strike halted trains across France for a day and caused major disruption in Paris.

OVERNIGHT TALKS

Air France is part of the Air France KLM group, the world's largest airline by revenue. Air France KLM was formed in 2004 by the merger of the French airline with Dutch carrier KLM.