Brazil Subway Workers Suspend Strike

 Subway Union workers moves to temporarily halt transport strike that has caused chaos in Brazil's biggest city ahead of World Cup.
A Brazilian court has ordered the worker's union to pay a hefty fine for each day of the strike

Brazil's metro union has decided to suspend a Sao Paulo subway workers' strike until Wednesday, the day before the opening match of Thursday's football World Cup.

Al Jazeera's Gabriel Elizondo, reporting from Sao Paulo, said Monday night's unexpected decision to temporarily halt the five-day strike did not follow a breakthrough in talks between the metro union and the government, but could have occurred following pressure from Sao Paulo residents.

Elizondo said the union would meet again on Wednesday to decide whether the strike - which has created traffic chaos in Brazil's biggest city - would continue.

Earlier on Monday Sao Paulo police clashed with striking subway workers who had continued to stay away from work despite a court declaring their strike to be illegal.

Riot police firing tear gas pushed about 100 striking workers out of a station.

"This is the way they negotiate, with tear gas and repression," Alexandre Roland, a union leader, told the AP news agency as he and others regrouped outside the station after confronting riot police.

The striking workers marched toward the city centre, where they planned to join a wide-ranging rally by various activist groups, including homeless workers demanding low-cost housing and a group calling for free public transportation.