BERLIN (AP) -- Express delivery company DHL is shutting down a branch that depends on a Nokia Corp. plant in Germany which is to close in June, a move that will affect some 230 employees, DHL's parent company said Wednesday.
The DHL facility is located on the grounds of the Nokia plant in Bochum, said Claus Korfmacher, a spokesman for parent company Deutsche Post AG. ''If Nokia closes, we will have no orders either'' at the branch, he added.
Plans call for the DHL site to close along with the Nokia plant on June 30. ''We are trying at the moment to find replacement jobs for our employees at DHL and in the company as a whole,'' Korfmacher said.
Nokia drew sharp criticism from German unions and politicians when it announced in January that it planned to close the plant in Bochum in the industrial Ruhr region, with the likely loss of 2,300 jobs.
Nokia Chief Executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo has apologized for the decision to close the plant but has said it was necessary, given that the factory makes 6 percent of Nokia's handsets but accounts for 23 percent of its global labor costs.
