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As of Wednesday, 16 entrepreneurs continued their week-long hunger strike protesting the decision of the local authorities to close a market in the town of Komsomolsk-on-Amur in the Khabarovsky region.

The traders announced the hunger strike on April 2 to demonstrate their stern opposition to the decision to shut down the market ‘Metallurg’ where all of them have worked for more than 10 years. The protestors demand that the market, which serves 80 percent of the population, remains open.

According to federal law, by 2010 all markets in Russia should be modernized and well-organized.The traders expressed their readiness to revamp the territory of the market. They also have gathered more than 7,500 signatures of local residents in support of the market, the head of the trade union for the market Yelena Subbotina said, Ria Novosti news agency reported.

According to the deputy head of the Komsomolsk administration in charge of trade issues, Sergei Semyonov, 400 million rubles is needed for the reconstruction of the market.

The Metallurg market should have been closed last year according to the ruling of Russia’s consumer rights watchdog Rospotrebnadzor, Semyonov noted. However local authorities decided to prolong the terms of its reorganization until August of 2008 to let businesses find new places of work, he stressed.

Semyonov also indicated that the administration had offered the traders to move to markets in other places. Currently there are 12 markets operating in Komsomolsk-on Amur but the number will shrink at least by one third by Jan.1, 2010. Semyonov revealed that the territory of the market will be used for construction of a block of flats.

The protesters say they will continue the hunger strike until the decision is changed.

On Wednesday two of the protesters were taken to the hospital but rejoined their fellow activists on the same day after receiving medical treatment. “One of the protesters had high blood pressure and another had a kidney aggravation,” Subbotina said, as television channel Vesti reported.

“The conditions of the people on the hunger strike are satisfactory but raise concerns since they have been without food for eight days and are sleeping on the floor,” she added.

The protesters state that in case the city’s authorities do not show the willingness to compromise they will stop drinking water to make the hunger strike even more extreme, Interfax news agency reported.