Thousands of Volkswagen workers were to go on strike Monday in an escalating industrial dispute at the crisis-hit German auto giant with thousands of jobs at stake. Its woes reflect a broader crisis in the European auto industry,

Volkswagen workers will go on warning strikes on Monday at plants across Germany, labour union IG Metall said, marking the first large-scale walkouts at Volkswagen's domestic operations since 2018. The start of the strikes represents a further escalation of a dispute between Europe's top carmaker and its workers over mass layoffs,

IG Metall said its members would down tools for a few hours a day after the auto giant and union leaders failed to agree on how to cut costs.

Volkswagen workers across Germany are ready to strike from early December, the IG Metall union said in a pamphlet circulated on Friday.

An agreement not to hold strikes ended on November 30. "Accordingly, strikes are possible and also necessary from the beginning of December," the union said. "Volkswagen will determine at the negotiating table how long and how hard the conflict will be - the VW workforce throughout the country is ready to strike," it added.

Volkswagen has rejected a proposal from labor representatives that they said could avert layoffs and factory closures. VW said it wouldn't have delivered the advertised savings. Strikes loom in the brewing labor dispute.

German Volkswagen employees have reached their limit. They are threatening a warning strike that could potentially escalate into a prolonged protest. On 21 November, after the third round of negotiations with the company's management ended in failure,