Zawya.com. October 10
2001. Cuba
BRUSSELS, Oct 10, 2001 (Inter Press Service via COMTEX) -- Repression
against trade unionists, including reported assassinations, "disappearances,"
physical attacks and detentions, is on the increase worldwide, according to a
survey released here this week.
The latest edition of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions
(ICFTU) Annual Survey of Violations of Trade Union Rights, catalogues events
from the year 2000 in nearly 150 countries.
It shows that the number of trade unionists "killed in the line of duty"
has risen by a "staggering" 50 percent over the previous year's
findings.
The survey said that last year 209 trade unionists had been killed, about
8,500 arrested, 3,000 more injured and "over 100,000 harassed and nearly
20,000 dismissed because of their trade union activities."
Latin America is the most dangerous region in the world for trade unionists
and Colombia the most dangerous country, according to the ICFTU. Several
thousand Colombian trade unionists have been killed in the past decade, twice as
many 153 unionists were killed or "disappeared" last year as in 1999,
notes the survey.
The majority of assassinations are attributed to the paramilitaries (about
76 percent according to the United Nations High Commission on Human Rights),
followed by drug traffickers and the guerrillas.
The killings were concentrated in the Antioquia department (Medellin
region). "It would be tempting, if Colombia could be omitted, to see an
improvement (over the previous year)," said ICFTU General Secretary Bill
Jordan in the introduction to the survey.
"But that would mean disregarding figures for arrests, acts of torture,
threats, interference in unions' internal affairs and repressive dismissals:
violations in all these categories are on the rise and have sometimes increased
up to threefold," he added.
Jordan said that faced with growing competition as a result of
globalization, enterprises worldwide openly threaten their workers with closure
or transferring production abroad, should they insist on their right to
establish or join trade unions.
Aside from Colombia, the ICFTU survey also points to a "most disturbing"
trade union rights situation in Guatemala, Venezuela, Costa Rica, China, South
Korea, Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Belarus and the Gulf States.
"Violence and persecution, death threats and murders, is also the order
of the day in Guatemala. On the banana and coffee plantations, as well as in the
textile shops or 'maquiladoras' owned by large corporations, trade unionists are
systematically intimidated," said the ICFTU survey.
In Costa Rica, it is common practice for private sector employees to refuse
to recognize a union, dismiss its leaders and members, and instead establish a
'soldiarismo' organization, "which offers workers benefits in exchange for
renunciation of the union and promises of industrial peace," it said.
In Central American (Nicaragua, Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Honduras
and Panama) export-processing zones are "rights- free zones where trade
unionists are constantly persecuted," said the survey, which points to 33
countries where this problem exists.
In the Philippines, a study carried out in seven export processing zones
showed employers were targeting unionists, while in Bangladesh, trade unions are
still banned from the zones and workers harassed it they demand their rights.
In Turkey and Namibia, strikes are banned in the zones. The ICFTU found that
Asia also has recorded a record number of violations and accounts for 71 percent
of arrests and 87 percent of cases of harassment of trade unionist throughout
the world.
In China, "any attempt to create an independent trade union is
immediately crushed. Those who try to organize one are sent to psychiatric
hospitals or forced labor camps, where they are single out for ill treatment."
In South Korea, the survey notes that more trade unionists have now been
imprisoned since President Kim Dae Jung came to power than under his
predecessor. The police systematically intervene and imprison strikers on
charges of "obstructing business."
The slowdown in the U.S. economy is having its greatest impact in Asia,
affecting its export industries and putting additional pressure on employment,
wages and working conditions.
Even the most successful economies in the region (Japan, Singapore, and
Taiwan) are facing very low growth or total recession. "All this has led to
the erosion of trade union rights," said the ICFTU.
In Africa, in nearly 60 percent of the countries examined in the survey,
workers have been dismissed for their trade union activities. Where no violence
is used, the authorities often resort to legislation to restrict the right to
strike.
In Zimbabwe, the ICFTU notes that dozens of opponents of President Robert
Mugabe's regime, including at least two trade unionists, fell victim to the
violence that has swept the country.
In countries under authoritarian rule, unions are sometimes the only
organized opposition, said the survey.
"When the use of force is not enough to keep them quiet, the
authorities do not hesitate to interfere in trade union affairs, forming puppet
unions, confiscating union assets or aggravating divisions within the unions,"
said the survey.
The survey points to 108 countries were there are legal obstacles to the
establishment of a trade union. Some ban them altogether (Bhutan, Burma and
Equatorial Guinea); others prevent all independent trade union activity (Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, Syria and Iraq) or replace them with
so-called "Consultative Committees" (Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, the United
Arab Emirates).
Trade unions in these countries are subservient to the government and do
nothing to defend workers' interests, said the ICFTU.
"In many countries, it is no longer tolerable for authoritarian regimes
to see workers demonstrate against the non-payment of wages: as often as not,
workers claiming the right to be paid for work performed face beatings,
detention or death," said Jordan.
Three years after the International Labor Organization's (ILO) Declaration
of Fundamental Principles and Rights to Work have reached the highest levels
ever recorded, he said.
Where legislation prohibiting anti-union discrimination exists, it is often
ignored. "There is something paradoxical in the contrast between the
international community's increasing outspokenness on international labor
standards and reality on the ground," said the ICFTU general secretary.
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