Dockers strike at major Chinese port

Hundreds of Chinese workers demanding overtime pay went on strike at one of the world's busiest ports, holding up thousands of shipping containers at the terminal in southern China, Hong Kong newspapers reported Wednesday.

Crane operators and truck drivers at the Chiwan Container Terminal in the boomtown of Shenzhen stopped working at midnight on Tuesday, pro-Beijing newspaper Wen Wei Po in Hong Kong reported.

A man who answered the phone at the port's offices said services had partially resumed on Tuesday, but he refused to give more details.

Calls to the company's headquarters and the local government went unanswered because of the weeklong labor holiday in mainland China.

More than 400 dock workers were unhappy about wages and have accused management of failing to pay them overtime as required by labor laws, Hong Kong's South China Morning Post reported.

They staged a sit-in outside the container terminal's headquarters on Tuesday, the paper said. Police were called in to maintain order, but no violence was reported, the paper said.

The Post quoted an unnamed worker who said they took industrial action on International Labor Day to express their anger.

"Many of us have sacrificed our health and spare time to work for the company. We only have one or two days of rest each month. The company should treat us better," the man was quoted as saying.

Dockers earned about 4,000 yuan ($519) on average per month, the paper reported. The wage is considered high as government statistics showed the national average monthly urban wage in 2006 was 980 yuan ($127).

Chiwan Container Terminal is one of the world's busiest, having processed a total of 5 million 20-foot equivalent units of containers in 2006, according to its Web site.

Chiwan Container Terminal is a joint venture among Chiwan Wharf Holdings Limited, Hong Kong's Kerry Holdings Limited and Hidoney Development Limited.