Amazon workers in Germany extend strike

September 24, 2014 04:29 pm | Updated 05:02 pm IST - BERLIN

Employees of Amazon gather in front of an Amazon building during a strike in Graben, southern Germany, Monday, Sept. 22, 2014. Workers at four of Amazon.com's German distribution centers have started a two-day strike in a long-running dispute over wages. The ver.di union said workers at the American online retailer's logistics centers in Leipzig, Bad Hersfeld, Graben and Rheinberg will stay off the job until Tuesday evening. Banner reads: "Today we fight for respect". (AP Photo/dpa, Karl-Josef Hildenbrand)

Employees of Amazon gather in front of an Amazon building during a strike in Graben, southern Germany, Monday, Sept. 22, 2014. Workers at four of Amazon.com's German distribution centers have started a two-day strike in a long-running dispute over wages. The ver.di union said workers at the American online retailer's logistics centers in Leipzig, Bad Hersfeld, Graben and Rheinberg will stay off the job until Tuesday evening. Banner reads: "Today we fight for respect". (AP Photo/dpa, Karl-Josef Hildenbrand)

Workers at >Amazon.com in Germany have extended a strike in a long-running wage dispute into a third day and targeted a fifth distribution center.

The German ver.di union called workers at facilities in Leipzig, Bad Hersfeld, Graben and Rheinberg out on a two-day strike on Monday. It then extended that by a day and on Wednesday added a center in the western town of Werne to the walkouts.

Amazon employs some 9,000 people in total at nine sites in Germany.

For more than a year, the union has been pushing for higher pay, arguing that Amazon workers receive lower wages than others in retail and mail-order jobs.

Amazon says its distribution warehouses in Germany are logistics centers and employees already earn relatively high wages for that industry.

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