In the News

US companies express alarm over priest’s slay

Manila Bulletin
11/08/2006

At least seven big foreign-owned companies, including Wal-Mart, have expressed alarm over cases of killings, violence and attacks against workers on strike in Cavite.

In their joint letter on Nov. 7 to President Arroyo, the companies — American Eagle Outfitters, Gap Inc., Jones Apparel Group, Liz Claiborne Inc., PVH, Polo Ralph Lauren and Wal-Mart, expressed alarm on behalf of their companies over the "violent attacks on striking workers and the assaults and killings of labor rights promoters."

Liberia’s Foreign Investment Challenge

BBC News
11/08/2006

By Bill Law

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE EXTENDED RADIO REPORT (This report begins 1:16 into recording; Firestone section begins at 13:42)

For years Liberia has traded its natural resources in return for services such as health and education from foreign corporations but have Liberians paid too high a price?

"These buildings were destroyed on the premise that they belonged to somebody else and that is the story all across Liberia," said Olu Menjay.

Murder in Colombia Prompts Group to Sue Nestle Units in Miami

Miami Herald
10/28/2006

The widow of a brutally murdered Nestlé worker joins others in a lawsuit against the firm over her

husband's death.

BY JANE BUSSEY

jbussey [at] MiamiHerald.com

Colombian trade unionist Luciano Enrique Romero died a slow death. The fired Nestlé factory worker, whose body was found in a paramilitary-controlled area of Colombia a year ago, was tied up, tortured and then stabbed 40 times.

Colombian Union Fights for Flower Farm

Associated Press
10/18/2006

By Joshua Goodman

FACATATIVA, Colombia -- When workers at Colombia's largest flower grower organized themselves into a union a few years ago, they won protections against overly long hours, potentially dangerous exposure to pesticides and other abuses.

But in an increasingly globalized economy, the effort may also have cost the employees of Dole Food Co.'s flower division their jobs.

Last week, Estela Yepes was on her way out of work at the Splendor-Corzo flower farm outside of Bogota, the Colombian capital, when she was handed a one-page letter.

Group Accuses Jordan of Failing to Enforce Labor Rights

Los Angeles Times
10/17/2006

By Evelyn Iritani

For more than a year, the Bangladeshi garment workers toiled as long as 16 hours a day at a factory in Jordan's free trade zone, sewing women's apparel for companies including J.C. Penney Co. and Target Corp.

They received less than 50 cents an hour for working as many as 100 hours a week, labor activists said. Last spring, 175 workers walked out of the Atateks garment factory in Al Tajamouat Industrial City in Sahab, Jordan, at the end of an eight-hour shift after their request for more money and better working conditions was refused.

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