As reported previously, it is only through being organsed that workers will be able to enforce safe working conditions and win a living wage. With the international spotlight fading on Bangladesh, the government is starting to crack down on garment workers to stop their attempts to organise. This comes at […]
Monthly Archives: May 2013
29 posts
The collapse of a new mining tunnel at the giant Freeport McMoran mine in the highlands of West Papua, Indonesia has now claimed the lives of 28 workers with no hope of finding any more survivors. This copper and gold mine began as an open cut mine but is now […]
As previously reported, the struggle by workers to form their own union at the Maruti Suzuki factory started in 2011. For their efforts, workers have been harassed, sacked and imprisoned. A support campaign was set up to defend and help workers and their families. This week, a protest site was […]
Three years ago, a sit in by ‘Red Shirt’ demonstrators was attacked by the Thai military and almost a 100 protesters were killed. No one has been brought to justice for these murders. Last week, tens of thousand of people held a commemoration to remember those that had died. Subsequent […]
Thousands of migrant construction workers in Dubai staged a four day strike against their employer, Arabtec, over unpaid wages and an increase in their allowances. Trade unions in Dubai are banned and migrant workers are employed on low wages and long days. Strikes are very rare. The workers faced harassment […]
This week the Ford Motor company announced the intention to close its factories in Melbourne, Australia by 2016. This will put an estimated 1,200 workers out of a job. This is not an isolated case with car companies all over the world shifting production, increasing the work intensity, and outsourcing […]
Since independence in 1957, the coalition of ‘Barisan Nasional’ has governed Malaysia continuously. In a worrying development given the government’s past use of the Internal Security Act (ISA), four leading opposition activists and politicians have been arrested and charged under the country’s sedition laws. Since the May 5 general elections, […]
On the 13 of May, Mr. Abdul Waheed Khan, a well known human rights defender, social activist and educationist was assassinated by unknown gunmen. This is the second time in as many months that an activist with the Orangi Pilot Project (OPP) has been murdered. The OPP works with poor […]
Amid worsening economic conditions, unions in Sri Lanka organised a general strike against the recent electricity price hikes. Around 10,000 workers participated in the main rally. It has been three years since the end of the war against the LTTE in the north of the island, and this was the […]
In the aftermath of the Rana Plaza factory fire in Bangladesh, the deadliest industrial disaster since the Bhopal explosion in 1984, dozens of multinational clothing companies have signed on to a new Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh. This agreement was initiated by a number of unions and […]