Prosecutors plan to charge striking air traffic controllers with sedition

Attorney General says strikers committed "very serious" offense.

The state prosecutor plans to charge air traffic controllers who abandoned their posts last Friday causing air traffic in Spain to collapse at the start of the extended Constitution Day holiday with sedition, an offense that carries a jail term of up to eight years, Attorney General Cándido Conde-Pumpido said Thursday.

Speaking before attending a meeting of prosecutors in Zaragoza, Conde-Pumpido said the case against the controllers would be fast-tracked. The chief prosecutor said the attitude of controllers who called in sick or claimed they had already fulfilled their workload for the year constituted a "very serious" offense that carries prison sentences of between three to eight years.

The meeting in Zaragoza was called to coordinate the different areas of legal action to be initiated against the controllers, who are due to appear before the Madrid prosecutors office today.

The wildcat strike caused 5,000 flights to be cancelled, leaving 700,000 would-be travelers stranded. The government eventually late Friday declared a state of alert, ordering the military to control towers to get air traffic moving again.

(Published by El País - December 9, 2010)