Meeting geared at circumventing university strike ends with no result

By JPOST.COM STAFF
Negotiations between representatives of the Finance Ministry and university heads collapsed on Wednesday evening with no results. Sources in the Committee of University Presidents said that only moments after negotiations began, Finance Ministry officials said they were not going to approve the demand to transfer NIS 480 million to the higher education system. However, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is scheduled to convene with Education Minister Yuli Tamir and Finance Minister Roni Bar-On on Thursday to make a final attempt at circumventing an impending strike that would delay the opening of the school year. Earlier, dozens of students tried to barge into the Knesset but were prevented by the Knesset Guard Force. Student Union leader Boaz Toporovsky was briefly detained and interrogated but released later in the evening. Students also tried to barge into the Finance Ministry building but were stopped by security guards.