Grupo Mexico SAB, the largest mining company in Mexico, won its bid to have a five-month strike at the Cananea copper mine declared illegal after losing $600 million in sales.
Police ejected strikers from all the gates to the mine in Cananea, about 100 miles southeast of Tucson, on Friday, putting the mine back in its owners' control. About 400 workers resumed their duties Friday night.
The action by hundreds of police officers occurred Friday morning after a Mexican federal labor board declared the strike illegal.
The board ruled that the strike can't be allowed because the 1,287 workers at Cananea didn't follow proper procedure when they walked out on July 30, according to a statement from Mexico's Labor Ministry.
The owners are inspecting the mine and doing an evaluation of damage sustained during the strike, said Benjamín Bolaños, spokesman for Grupo Mexico. It's unclear how long it will take to resume production at the mine, he said.
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"We were confident most of the workers didn't want the strike," Bolaños said. "Almost everyone from the night shift went back to work. That means everything is going fine."
Juan Gutiérrez, Sonora representative for the national miners union, said workers were meeting Friday and planned to make a statement about whether they will respect the federal decision or fight it. Juan Linares, head of the national miners union's executive committee, said the union plans to appeal the labor board's decision declaring the strike illegal.
Tensions between Grupo Mexico and its largest union have grown since the union's president, Napoleon Gomez Urrutia, was indicted by a federal court and three state courts in 2006. He was accused of embezzling $55 million from a fund for union workers.
Clashes occurred Friday as the officers moved in and took the four gates to the mine complex from strikers who were occupying them. Trucks were burned, tear gas fired and mining installations damaged as police tried to take back the gates, El Imparcial newspaper reported.
However, conditions had calmed down by midday, said Oscar Hernández, a city spokesman. "Everything is normal," Hernández said.
A melee between workers and police resulted in nine arrests, but those arrested were later released, and no injuries were reported, he said.
Grupo Mexico will need three months to reach full production at the mine, said Juan Pablo Becerra, a mining analyst with Standard & Poor's Inc. in Mexico City.
The Cananea mine is owned by Southern Copper Corp., a publicly traded mining company based in Phoenix that is majority-owned by Grupo Mexico.
Grupo Mexico also is the nominal owner of Asarco LLC, the Tucson-based company that owns copper mines and a smelter in Southern Arizona. However, Asarco is in bankruptcy, and a judge has appointed a board on which Grupo Mexico is a minority, leaving Asarco semiautonomous.
"We expect production to resume soon," said Juan Rebolledo, a Grupo Mexico vice president, without giving a specific date.
Did you know . . .
Cananea's copper miners have a history of labor activism that even played a role in the 1910 Mexican Revolution. In 1906, 5,000 Cananea miners walked off the job, protesting the low wages and poor working conditions their American bosses provided. Mexican soldiers and a troop of Arizona Rangers sent in to break up the strike killed dozens of miners.
The incident helped set off the Mexican Revolution four years later.
More recently, strikes have occurred in 2006, 2004, 2003 and 1998-99, according to Star archives. In 1989, the federal government sent in soldiers to close the mine amid bitter labor negotiations.
