PETIT-CANAL, Guadeloupe -- About 3,000 mourners on Sunday turned the funeral for a labor-union activist killed in Guadeloupe into a political demonstration, calling out for higher wages and respect from the French government.People clad mostly in white packed a gymnasium in the cane-growing area of Petit-Canal to hear poems about struggle and songs in homage to Jacques Bino, the labor-union activist shot to death last week in the French overseas department, apparently by rioting youths.
Some of the participants wore T-shirts emblazoned with images of Bino, who was killed as he drove home from a meeting with the organizers of protests that have paralyzed the French island for more than a month. His body was displayed in an open casket for two days.
"We are saddened, but we will continue the fight," Guadeloupe protest leader Elie Domota told mourners in a speech.
In the crowd, Adele Goram, an islander from a nearby town, said she attended the ceremony for Bino because she wanted Paris to "respect" Guadeloupe, a French overseas possession with deep economic and social disparities.
The strike by workers demanding a higher wages in Guadeloupe began in late January and has been marked by resentment of the tiny elite who control the island's economy. Strikes have spread to neighboring Martinique.
The Sunday ceremony in Petit-Canal attracted Segolene Royal, former presidential candidate for the French Socialist Party. She sat in the crowd but did not speak.
Meanwhile, an agreement between Guadeloupe's employers and its striking workers is likely not imminent, the head of France's employers' federation said Sunday.
Federation chief Laurence Parisot warned that talks are "still very complex," suggesting an end to the standoff might not be around the corner.
"The latest news that I received last night demonstrated that we were perhaps not that near a deal," Parisot told Europe-1 radio in an interview Sunday.
Tensions in Guadeloupe have largely died down after a televised address Thursday by French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who announced a euro580 million ($730 million) financial package to help development in France's overseas regions.
French officials have suggested an accord that would end the standoff was on the horizon, but negotiations have proven slow.
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER JENNY BARCHFIELD CONTRIBUTED TO THIS REPORT FROM PARIS.