Amazon strike in Germany enters second week

Berlin - A strike by workers employed at Amazon's German operations entered its second week on Monday, with the action threatening to disrupt the US online retailer's business in the last shopping days before Christmas.

Workers employed at Amazon's dispatch centres at Bad Hersfeld, Rheinberg and Leipzig, walked off the job again on Monday after a brief pause on Sunday, the Verdi service union said.

The current strike action is set to continue until Wednesday, but the union has warned of further industrial action as part of a long-running dispute over a wage agreement.

The workers employed by Amazon stepped up their industrial action against the company in the middle of this month.

Verdi has launched a series of strikes for more than a year to try to force Amazon to agree to a collective wage agreement that would recognize its German employees as retail warehouse workers.

Instead, Amazon insists that its dispatch sites in Germany are logistics centres, where lower hourly rates prevail under the nation's law.