By Doug Cunningham

The massive French worker-student protests have succeeded in getting a new labor law that discriminates against younger workers tossed out. French President Jacques Chirac says the law – called the first employment contract or CPE - will be abolished and replaced with new measures to try to deal with youth unemployment.

Students began protesting the new law that would have allowed employers to fire workers 26 and younger without cause within two years of hiring them. Unions joined the student protests, putting millions of people into the streets nationwide in France to vigorously oppose the law.

Helene Bonneau of the French labor federation CGT said this law was an attack on labor standards in France, part of a more general assault on labor rights and protections. She said all workers would ultimately be affected by a weakening of these labor standards and that’s why unions mobilized the massive demonstrations demanding – and winning – an end to the new law.

It remains to be seen what the government will try to do now regarding youth unemployment in France.

Unions had given the government until Easter weekend to withdraw the law or face general strikes. Unions and students say this is a great victory.