FACTBOX-Economic storm pounding euro zone brings protests

Feb 22 (Reuters) - Here are some details on protests in three euro zone countries whose economies are facing severe stress over high debt levels and repayments.

* GREECE - The two biggest unions representing about half of Greece's 5 million-strtong workforce plan a one-day general strike on Wednesday to protest against a deficit-cutting programme. This includes plans for a public-sector wage freeze, tax increases, including a VAT hike, and welfare cuts.

-- All but emergency flights to and from Greece will be grounded on Wednesday, while public services, hospitals and schools will shut down.

-- Protests so far have been largely symbolic and lacked widespread public support. Opinion polls show most of Greece's 11 million population back the government's EU-driven austerity plan provided the pain is shared.

-- The government, which is struggling with a debt crisis, this month won a first victory over the unions, when farmers abandoned their last blockade empty handed and tax officials cancelled a 24-hour planned strike.

-- Customs officials on Monday ended a strike which had left filling stations in Athens dry of fuel, after some regions voted to halt the action and a court declared the strike illegal.

* PORTUGAL - Lisbon is scrambling to cut its budget deficit to assure markets it will not be the next weak link in the euro zone after Greece.

-- Public administration workers are set to hold a one-day strike on March 4 organised by the Common Front union. Last week figures showed the jobless rate rose above 10 percent in Q4 for the first time since the series began in 1998, putting more pressure on the government as it seeks ways to cut spending.

* SPAIN - Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's minority Socialist government is trying to convince debt markets that Spain is in better shape than Greece, but proposed reforms so far have infuriated trade unions.

-- The unions, long supportive of the Socialists, plan protest marches beginning from Tuesday in Barcelona, Madrid and Valencia against its proposals to raise the retirement age by two years to 67.

-- In an ominous sign for Zapatero, a poll published last week by the left-leaning newspaper Publico, usually in favour of the government, showed 49 percent of Spaniards would back a general strike against raising the retirement age.

(For a story on the eurozone please click on [ID:nLDE61L19D])

(Writing by David Cutler, London Editorial Reference Unit; Editing by Michael Roddy)