Decentralised leadership Boris Yeltsin (President of Russia)Sergey Kiriyenko (Prime Minister of Russia)Nikolai Aksyonenko (Minister of Railways) The 1998 Russian miners' strike, also known as the "rail war", was a strike of Russian coal miners over the non-payment of wages after a year.
[...] In one family, a schoolboy hanged himself, and left a note that said, 'I'm tired of listening to [my father's] quarrels with my mother over money.'
Strikers in the Kuzbass only allowed trains of local origin, strategic importance, or those providing aid to miners.
[2] In late May, a commission headed by Deputy Prime Minister Oleg Sysuyev [ru] arrived in the Kuzbass.
[2] By 1 June, however, the government had failed to fulfil its promises, and strikes, as well as blockages of important routes, resumed.
That day, the blockage of lines in the Kuzbass ceased for the final time, and strikers returned to work.
[2] A 1998 report by the Moscow Helsinki Group on the strikes stated, "Indignation at the illegal delays in wages and the inability to tolerate the brazen continuation of non-payments have brought popular opinion in the coal regions to such a fury that people, striving for legitimate goals and values recognised by society, are ready to achieve them by illegal and destructive means.