UPDATE 1-Ontario Navistar workers reject contract offer

TORONTO, July 2 (Reuters) - More than 900 Navistar International Corp (NAV.N: Quote, Profile, Research) workers in Chatham, Ontario, have rejected the company's latest contract offer, the Canadian Auto Workers union said on Thursday.

The most recent collective agreement expired on Tuesday, and the company has since indefinitely laid off the remaining 350 workers at its International Truck and Engine Corp plant in Chatham, on top of the 800 already on layoff, the CAW said.

Navistar has said it plans to shift much of its heavy-duty truck production from Chatham to lower-cost locations in the southwestern United States and Mexico.

"We cannot expect our members to accept a contract that will eliminate their jobs and devastate their already hard hit community," CAW President Ken Lewenza said in a statement.

"We need a real commitment from the company on the future of this plant. So far, what we've seen from Navistar only includes eliminating hundreds of jobs and moving production out of the country to the United States and Mexico."

At its peak in the late 1990s, the company employed about 2,500 people in Chatham, which is 290 km (180 miles) southwest of Toronto and has a population of about 100,000. (Reporting by John McCrank; editing by Rob Wilson)