Shops Closed 4th Day in Guadeloupe

POINTE-A-PITRE, Guadeloupe — Separatists dismantled roadblocks Saturday, but shops and businesses stayed shut on the fourth day of a general strike on the French Caribbean island of Guadeloupe.

The atmosphere was tense, with few people on the streets and almost no traffic. All gas stations were closed, and fuel was beginning to run short.

The stoppage was called to demand the release of jailed activist Georges Faisans, now in the eighth week of a hunger strike in France. Faisans, a black schoolteacher born in Guadeloupe, was sentenced last month to three years in prison for wounding a white teacher who had allegedly insulted a black student.

Disagreement between the two main independence movements led to the removal of barricades that had blocked all vehicle movement in and out of the main town, Pointe-a-Pitre, political sources said.