New Wave of Fuel Protests Hits Europe; Israel May Join In

The wave of fuel price protests sweeping through Europe regained momentum Monday after a weekend lull, while shaken governments scrambled to limit the political fallout.

Monday’s protests centered on Scandinavia, but blockades sprang up at the Spanish port of Barcelona and in Slovenia, and Israeli truckers threatened to stage their own demonstrations starting today.

In Norway, demonstrators blocked 11 oil terminals at key ports along the south and west coasts Monday, but they later called off their protests under the threat of police action.

Swedish truckers and farmers partially blockaded southern ports and ferries to protest a planned increase in the tax on diesel fuel. The protests were expected to involve about 400 drivers and stop traffic from ferries between Sweden and Denmark and Sweden and Germany.

Spanish fishermen, meanwhile, sealed off Barcelona’s port, and truckers laid siege to fuel distribution points in the center of the country.

Drivers throughout the continent, dismayed at the rising price of gasoline and diesel sparked by higher world oil prices, have been demanding that their governments reduce the tax burden on fuel.

Some countries, such as France and Italy, have made concessions, while Britain and others have refused to budge. Most, however, have agreed to discuss truckers’ demands and are planning to appeal to the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries for more crude output to bring prices down.

In Britain, where fuel supplies were gradually returning to normal after last week’s blockades, Prime Minister Tony Blair was assessing the political damage.

Conservative opposition leader William Hague called the protests “a genuine taxpayers’ revolt” and said taxes are now “the hottest domestic political issue” facing Britain.

Europe adopted high gas taxes decades ago as an environmental measure to discourage excessive fuel consumption. Taxes range from 51% in Greece to 73% in Britain, where diesel cost an average of $4.33 a gallon last month.

Norway, the No. 2 oil exporter in the world behind Saudi Arabia, had escaped the first days of protests even though it has some of the highest gasoline and diesel prices.

Monday, however, hundreds of truckers blocked terminals in Oslo, Fredrikstad, Toensberg and Stavanger, all on the southern coast, and two terminals and the Mongstad oil refinery near Bergen in the west.