Russia's air-traffic controllers, facing prosecution for a one-day walkout in August that shut down 40 of the country's airports, are expected to strike back at the government Wednesday.


This time the fight is to take place not on the airfields, but in Russia's high court.


The union is scheduled to challenge an Aug. 14 ruling of the Moscow city prosecutor's office, which stated -- on the eve of the walkout -- that it would be illegal for air-traffic controllers to strike because the walkout could jeopardize the lives of passengers.


It was the first time the Russian federation declared a strike to be illegal and was in stark contrast to last spring's strikes of Russian health care, medical and transportation workers, who gained pay increases after striking.


"The court will show whether we live in a law abiding state or not", said Vladimir Brodulev, vice president of the Federation of Air-Traffic Controller's Trade Unions of Russia, in a telephone interview Tuesday.


Russia does have a law prohibiting government employees, the military and "essential services" from striking, according to one western diplomat involved in labor issues here.


The court hearing is just the latest in a series of escalating events since the Aug. 15 strike.


Vladimir Konussenko, the union's president, said at the time that the strikers went back to work because of a promise from Vice President Alexander Rutskoi not to prosecute strikers.


A Rutskoi spokesman denied this promise.


Since then, the government has launched prosecutions against 15 strikers, who face up to four years in jail if convicted of "sabotaging" the nation's air space.


The government also fired two strike leaders and reduced the pay of "dozens" of others across the country, Brodulev said yesterday.


Yevgeny Igranov, chairman of a local branch of the air-traffic controllers at Sheremetyevo airport, said the union would vote later this month on whether or not to hold a second strike in mid-November if their salaries were not increased.


The air-traffic controllers want their base salaries to increase from 7, 000 rubles to 15, 000 rubles a month.