MOSCOW, Feb 26 (AFP) - Teachers, health workers and museum employees went on strike across Russia on Wednesday to demand higher wages and protest about not being paid on time, Russian media reported.
Workers in 70 of the country's 89 regions joined the strike, ITAR-TASS news agency reported.
Teachers in the Siberian village of Tayshet were striking to protest late payments, Channel One television reported, while teachers in Sakhalin, in the Far East, walked off the job for an hour Wednesday morning in protest, ITAR-TASS said.
Unions in the Siberian town of Altai said that 100,000 people were set to join the strike, the news agency reported.
Workers are demanding that government double their pay, or raise it by at least 1.5 times its current amount, ITAR-TASS said. The government recently said it would raise salaries by 30 percent to stave off the strikes.
Public sector employees are also seeking payment arrears amounting to 2.5 billion rubles (80 million dollars, 74 million euros), it said.
At the end of last year, back pay owed to public sector workers amounted to 3.44 billion rubles, according to the state statistics committee.
The monthly wage for teachers, health and culture workers averages around 3,000 rubles (95 dollars, 88 euros), unions said.
The Moscow government banned workers in the city from demonstrating, but they still managed to distribute leaflets at some 60 metro stations around the city early Wednesday morning, ITAR-TASS said.