Korea

This report, from yesterday, is about the 3rd day of the police attack to evict the occupiers of the Ssangyong Motors factory at Pyeongtaek in South Korea. The cops and the strikebreaking gangsters ("kkang-pae") have resorted to using taser guns on individual strikers, in addition to using helicopters to spray a thinner-based teargas liquid directly onto the strikers on the roof of the occupied paint department.

South Korean police were not able to carry through with a pledge to enter a Ssangyong Motor Co. factory, which has been occupied by fired workers for almost two months, as the carmaker tries to resume production at the plant.

About 800 fired employees were still in a paint shop, confronting more than 3,000 police as of 5:22p.m. on Monday 20 July, in Seoul, Ssangyong spokesman Cha Ki Woong said by phone at the plant in Pyeongtaek, where the automaker is based.

Workers at South Korean automaker Ssangyong Motor went on strike in May in protest at plans for mass layoffs to save the firm from bankruptcy.

The South Korean government has issued arrest warrants for the entire leadership of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) and several of its affiliates. Union leaders are holed up in the KCTU headquarters in Seoul, the building now surrounded by riot police.

From: http://thistuesday.org/node/170

Migrant workers television (MWTV) from South Korea reported today about the following latest alarming development:

Casualised Korean women workers have been campaigning for better wages and equality with men. They have begun a hunger strike.