Podgorica, (Montena-business) – Negotiations between the striking board of educational CITUM and the representatives of Ministry of Education about requests for changing and respecting the collective agreement, and paying unpaid salaries ended today about 3 p.m. without any agreement. The president of the striking board, Svetozar Bulatovic said to Montena-business that negotiations, which lasted for several hours, didn’t give any solution for the accumulated problems of employees in the educational sector and that it was only agreed about the methodology of further cooperation. “We agreed with representatives of the Ministry of Education to form a common commission, which will consider and propose by 1 February possibilities for increasing the coefficients from the Budget of Montenegro, which are the most important part of strikers’ demands” said Bulatovic. According to him, the Ministry of Education concluded that the strikers’ requests related to coefficients’ increase are beyond its financial possibilities. “That’s the reason why the striking board will demand a meeting with Prime Minister Filip Vujanovic, and insist that the Ministers, vice-presidents, and their assistants from the Ministries of Education, Finance, Labour and Social Care, are present at the meeting” claims Bulatovic. “The strike board agreed with the Ministry of Education about founding a Fund for making apartments for employed in educational institutions, and all pressures and disinformation about the motivation for the general strike were rejected” said Bulatovic. The strike by the educational workers, which includes 80% of them, started yesterday by reducing hours from 45 to 30 minutes. Educational workers demand that the collective agreement should be respected; increase of coefficients by 30% and paying of 4 unpaid salaries. af/bd