Yearly Archives: 2016

A huge database of incident reports from the Nauru concentration camp was leaked to the Australian media this week. It catalogue long lists of abuses, incidents, assaults and self harm that refugees have endured while imprisoned in Nauru. These documents come only weeks after Australia offshore concentration camps were condemned […]

It has been another big week in the fight against Samsung in South Korea. Earlier this month the news came that a 32-year-old worker, Yi Chang-oun, died of acute lymphoblastic leukemia after 3.5 years working with various chemicals at a Samsung plant. A few days later, investigators uncovered how South […]

While the end of colonial rule in India promised a new era, for workers employed in the extensive tea plantations, improvement has come at a glacial pace. Tea workers have been involved in many struggles in the past in an attempt to improve their working conditions and pay (see here […]

Free trade zones in Sri Lanka, as in many other parts of the world, are very difficult areas for workers to form independent unions. This has become an even more urgent task as there is an offensive by employers to try and make Free Trade Zones in Sri Lanka totally […]

A number of unions in India have come together to put out a call for an all India general strike for 2 September 2016. This is going to be the latest of a series of general strikes that workers have participated in over the last few years in India (see […]

The Malaysian Government abolished its repressive, colonial era Internal Security Act in 2012 after sustained pressure by activists for decades. It nevertheless had a number of other laws, such as the Sedition Act by which it has been able to detain and arrest opponents almost at will. Nevertheless, this month […]

The mining industry in Pakistan is poorly regulated, union organising is repressed, and enforcement of labour laws is weak. This results in workplaces that are incredibly dangerous to workers. In late July, the death of three more coalminers was reported from the Shahrigh coalmine, situated in the Balochistan province, Pakistan. […]

Israel, over the last decades, has developed one of the world’s biggest arms industries in the world. Since the September 11 attacks in the USA, the military establishment in Israel has done even better business by exploiting the ‘global terrorism issue’. One of the selling points for these merchants of […]

The Cavite Export Processing Zone in the Philippines hosts a number of large factories where unions are actively suppressed. NT Philippines Inc, a Japanese owned, electronics factory is the latest company that is trying to destroy a newly formed union among its 1,000 strong workforce. Union members are being isolated […]

Many thousands of Indian migrant workers in Saudi Arabia have been left in desperate conditions as the economic crisis deepens in that country. These Indian workers have been left with no money due to unpaid wages and no passports. They were literally starving until the Indian government shipped tens of […]