Workers criticize THY, union

ISTANBUL- Hürriyet Daily News

Turkish Airlines is set to launch direct flights to Scotland’s Edinburgh. More new destinations are on the airline’s agenda. DHA photo

Turkish Airlines, the national flag carrier, keeps on expanding its international routes but a recent labor problem remains unsolved.

As the talks between Labor Minister Faruk Çelik and Turkish Airlines Chairman Hamdi Topçu over the future of 350 sacked workers failed to achieve any result, a group of fired employees held yesterday a press meeting accusing both the airline and the trade union that represented them. Turkish Airlines laid off 305 employees who are claimed to have participated in a May 29 strike against a now-approved draft law that bans walkouts in the aviation sector.

A group calling themselves “The May 29 Union” said in an Istanbul press meeting yesterday that Hava-İş union had failed to manage the process in the right way, playing a big role in proclamation of the protest illegal by not taking the call for slowdown strike on. The Turkish Airlines management took the benefit of this, said Gözde Vardar, the spokesperson of the group

Turkish Airlines, meanwhile, will begin flights to Scotland’s capital city Edinburgh on July 16, the national flag carrier said in a statement yesterday.

The airliner also plans to begin flying to the Mongolian capital of Ulan Bator, Ivory Coast’s capital city Abidjan, Denmark’s Aalborg-Billund and Kyrgystan’s Osh in July.