A BRAZILIAN court has suspended the sacking of 1,000 fertiliser factory workers that prompted a mass strike at oil giant Petrobras.

Parana regional court ruled on Tuesday that the decision to fire the workers at Fafen-PR, a Petrobras subsidiary, was void until March 6.

The ruling was announced as over 1,000 oil workers rallied outside Petrobras HQ in Rio de Janeiro, waving trade-union banners and denouncing the layoffs.

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro appointed Roberto Castello Branco, who studied economics at the neoliberal University of Chicago, as Petrobras CEO last month.

Mr Castello has joined Economy Minister Paulo Guedes in advocating the privatisation of large sectors of the state-owned firm and said closing the fertiliser plant is a business decision.

But the United Tankers Federation (FUP) and United Workers Centre (CUT) union federations launched an indefinite strike, warning that the sackings were just the start of a downsizing and privatisation process likely to affect workers right across Petrobras’s activities.

The firm has mooted the sell-off of about half the country’s refining capacity and all linked logistical assets.

FUP negotiator Tadeu Porto welcomed the judge’s ruling but said that the action was “just beginning” despite a ruling on Monday by the superior labour court that it was illegal.

Judge Ives Gandra has imposed fines of almost £90,000 a day on the unions if it continues, though the federations say that they are appealing against them.

In just under three weeks the strike had paralysed 20,000 oil tankers, 11 refineries, seven onshore oilfields, seven thermoelectric plants, three gas treatment units, a lubricant plant, a biofuel plant and the fertiliser plant, Mr Porto said.

The action has won support from the opposition Workers’ Party but the government is maintaining fuel supplies with scab labour.