International unions

"Democratic and independent unions in Palestine have decided to join together in order to make their voices heard..."

When garment workers at the Dutch and Turkish-owned Metraco factory in Istanbul began to organize in February 2006, management responded with an anti-union campaign that is still underway. Your help is needed to pressure Metraco’s owners to reinstate workers unjustly dismissed for their organizing efforts, stop the anti-union campaign, and to recognize and negotiate with the Disk-Tekstil union about the problems in this workplace, which produces for a range of European brands.

Take action now at: http://www.cleanclothes.org/urgent/07-07-03.htm#action

CHINA'S OLYMPIC PROMISE

Following China's successful bid for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games,
both the Chinese authorities and International Olympic Games' officials
pledged that the Beijing Olympic Games would be a catalyst for the
improvement of human rights in China.

Some official merchandise for the 2008 Olympics in China has been made using child labour, forced overtime and low wages to boost profits, a report says. (BBC, June 07)

Oil workers in Basra in southern Iraq are on strike demanding local control of oil resources and back pay, targeting the central oil minister. However, the US puppet regime has issued arrest orders against union leaders, threatening to break the strike "with an iron fist". The reports here include a press release by the union, supportive coverage from a solidarity group and a news report from Reuters.

The International Textile, Garment and Leather Workers’ Federation believes pressure on Nike has paid off...

'Some people would like us to be better, some would like us not to exist'
Wal-Mart admits increasing unpopularity as unions organise huge protests outside glitz-fest (Guardian, Sat 2 June)

From BBC:

Public services in Portugal have been severly disrupted in an attempt by the country's largest trade union federation to call a general strike.

On April 12 the Cambodian Court of Appeals upheld the convictions of Born Samnang and Sok Samoeun for the 2004 murder of Free Trade Union of the Kingdom of Cambodia (FTUWKC) leader Chea Vichea. The FTUWKC maintains that these men are not the killers of Chea Vichea and that their detention is unjust. The union has appealed to the International Labour Organization (ILO) to establish an international committee to investigate and bring to justice the real killers of Chea Vichea, as well as those responsible for the murders of FTUWKC leaders Ros Sovannareth and Hy Vuthy.

Eight of the 12 workers arrested on this year’s May Day in the city of Sanandaj were released on bail today.

From the Food, Farm and Hotel Workers International, IUF

The biggest strike wave in Egypt since WW2 has begun... [from MERIP]

Teachers in Iran have staged another nationwide strike today in the follow-up to their over two-month long struggle over pay and conditions and to press for the release of their jailed colleagues.

· Thousands demonstrate for jobs, higher pay and right to organise and strike

· Worker activists arrested

From the International Labour Solidarity Committee of the Worker-communist Party of Iran

PRESIDENT OF THE AGRO-MINING FEDERATION OF SUR DE BOLIVAR DETAINED

On Monday morning, April 9, 2007, 29-year-old migrant farmworker organizer Santiago Rafael Cruz was tortured and brutally murdered in the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC, AFL-CIO) office in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, Mexico.

Declaration by labour organisations in Iran:

Mahmood Salehi, a leading labour activist from the city of Saghez was re-arrested on Monday April 9 by the Islamic regime’s security forces...

at plants and distribution sites in the USA, Canada, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and Luxembourg as well as at Coca-Cola plants in Guatemala and Uruguay

New York Times on union victory against Starbucks

Philippine garment workers still need your support as violence in the Cavite Export Processing Zone (CEPZ) continues.
Appeals and information from the Clean Clothes Campaign.

E-protest demanding Mugabe's state ends its persecution of trade unionists