In a story published on its website on Thursday, it reports that the employees working for the Editpress-owned weekly had been placed on extraordinary leave since the last edition came out on 6 June.

Group chief Jean-Lou Siweck had said the decision came from the board of directors in the face of declining advertising revenues.

According to L’essentiel, staff have not been included in negotiations between management and the union OGBL. A union spokesperson was quoted by the newspaper as saying the plan involved 10 redundancies and early retirement within two years on a voluntary basis. Efforts had reportedly been made to find work for the ten with the group’s other titles and at other French-language media in Luxembourg.

“Le Jeudi” was founded in 1997 and in 2019 had 26,700 readers, equivalent to 5.1% of the population, according to the TNS Ilres Plurimedia 2019 survey.