Mongolians protest over prices hikes

More than 20,000 people flooded the center of Mongolia's capital Friday to demand that the government do something about rising food prices that have nearly tripled in some cases.

Holding banners saying "Stop inflated food prices" and "Let the salaries of the working class increase," the protesters marched peacefully to demand that prices for rice, meat and flour be stabilized.

"We demand that the government of Mongolia take concrete action to stop the rising consumer prices which enrich a few companies and make lives of thousands of Mongolians unbearable," said S. Ganbaatar, president of the Mongolian Confederation of Trade Unions, which organized the protest.

He said the price of a 55-pound bag of flour had risen to $21.40 from $7.70 four months ago.

He said the confederation would organize a nationwide strike if the government does not act to lower prices.

The higher wheat prices were passed on to consumers a week ago when the price of a loaf of bread increased by about 50 percent.

"The increase of bread prices really affects us," said Munkhtuul, a 33-year-old high school teacher, go like many Mongolians goes by one name.

"Most of our salary is spent on food items such as meat, bread, rice. I don't know why food prices kept going up," she said.

Mongolia was self sufficient in wheat grain when Mongolia was satellite state of the Soviet Union, but after the democratic changes of the early 1990s many state-owned collective farms were privatized and collapsed.