Union calls for Lufthansa ground staff at major German airports to strike on Wednesday

A union has called on Lufthansa’s ground staff to walk off the job for a day on Wednesday in a pay dispute, the latest of several transport strikes in the country. The Ver.di union called on ground staff for the German airline at Frankfurt, Munich, Hamburg, Berlin and Duesseldorf airports to strike from 4 a.m. Wednesday. The union is seeking a 12.5% pay raise, or at least an extra 500 euros ($539) per month, in negotiations for nearly 25,000 employees, including check-in, aircraft handling, maintenance and freight staff. Lufthansa said it is working on a special timetable and criticized the scale of the strike early in the dispute.