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About 3,000 South Africans suffering from asbestos-related diseases are pressing for their compensation claims to be heard by courts in Britain. The claims are against British-based asbestos multinational Cape. 
 
&quot;These claims should be heard in Britain and should be settled quickly,&quot; said Fred Higgs in Durban today. Higgs, who is General Secretary of the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM), is himself a British citizen. He is in South Africa for the ICEM World Congress, which ended yesterday. 
 
&quot;It is a disgrace that Cape is even contesting the claims,&quot; Higgs said. &quot;It treated these people atrociously, and it should pay up immediately and in full.&quot; 
 
Many of the compensation claimants were employed in Cape's mining and milling operations in South Africa when they were children. That was during the apartheid era, and the children were forced to work in appalling conditions, with no protection against the deadly asbestos. 
 
In the latest round of the long legal battle between Cape and its victims, a British court ruled last month that the claims could not be heard in Britain. However, the claimants are now likely to take the matter to the House of Lords, Britain's highest court of appeal. &quot;We believe that the rights of the victims have been ignored in favour of commercial interests,&quot; their British lawyer said in London. 
 
The child labourers who survived Cape's ill-treatment are now adults, and many are desperately ill. This week, South African TV showed pictures of their emaciated bodies. 
 
The case took a macabre new turn on Thursday, when between 200 and 250 unmarked graves were discovered next to a mine dump in Prieska, near Kimberley. South Africa's ICEM-affiliated National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), which is backing the claimants, believes the graves are those of asbestos workers who died during the apartheid era. 
 
&quot;Delegates to our World Congress were outraged to hear about this case and about the latest discoveries,&quot; Higgs said today. &quot;There were immediate consultations between British delegates and the NUM, and they agreed that the cases must be heard in Britain without further ado.&quot; 
 
Both British and South African ICEM delegates went on South African TV last night to call for the immediate hearing of the claims in Britain and the payment of full compensation. 
 
The asbestos victims and their supporters in the Northern Cape are planning a protest march to urge the House of Lords to allow their case to be heard in Britain.

Asbestos: South Africans&#039; Case Should Be Heard In Britain

Just as Australian unions, asbestos victims and renegade building materials firm James Hardie were getting close last week to resolving an A$2 billion shortfall in an asbestos liability fund, the company&rsquo;s CEO and CFO resigned, taking a combined A$10 million severance package. Peter Macdonald and Peter Shafron still face Australian criminal charges on misleading investors and other deceptive stock market practices by establishing and then underfunding an asbestos victims fund. Hardie had cut its own liability in constructing the fund.

James Hardie’s Executives Take Massive Severance Payouts

A Swiss mega-union was created 16 October with the merger of four unions. The new union, called Unia, includes ICEM affiliate Syndicat Industrie &amp; Batiment (SIB) and now represents over one million workers. Unia covers Swiss workers from engineering to construction industries, and also in retail and catering sectors.

Four Unions Merge in Switzerland to Inform Unia

Affiliate CEP in Canada held its 6th National Convention in Quebec City and pledged to raise C$500,000 for HIV/AIDS relief in Africa. The money will be channelled through CEP&rsquo;s Humanity Fund which union members support by payroll deductions of one cent per hour. CEP also made a firm pledge to keep open the Mirimichi, New Brunswick, kraft pulp mill currently being shut by Finnish UPM Kymenne. By acclamation, Brian Payne was re-elected president of the 150,000-member CEP and Andre Foucault as secretary-treasurer.

CEP’s Congress in Canada Moves on Providing HIV/AIDS Relief

A week-long strike by ICEM affiliate Associated Mineworkers of Zimbabwe (AMWZ) ended 13 October with agreement by the Chamber of Mines to enter arbitration over a wage dispute. Specifically, to enter into wage talks quarterly, as promised by the employers&rsquo; group early this year. AMWZ won a ruling last month that financial incentives granted mine owners by the government and reserve bank must be passed to workers. The Chamber was appealing that ruling, thus the strike by 25,000 workers in coal, platinum, chrome, gold and other minerals. The AMWZ is insistent on quarterly wage bargaining since Zimbabwe&rsquo;s inflation rate runs at near 600%.

Zimbabwe’s Miners Come to Terms’s with Chamber of Mines

The All Pakistan Trade Union Federation held a mass rally and march across several industrial areas of Lahore. The demonstration was against government policies restricting wage hikes and collective bargaining, as well as rampant retrenchments and price hikes. Similar protest meetings were held in several industrial cities across Pakistan. The protests continued with a major march in Rawalpindi on 6 October.

Pakistan Labour Marches Against Government’s Labour Stand

Dutch affiliate FNV Bondgenoten continued its lead in protesting NL government&rsquo;s planned budget cuts last week. Some 200 union protestors barricaded the offices of the Social Affairs Ministry in The Hague 20 October to remind ministers that cuts to social programmes are unacceptable. Six days earlier, transport workers staged a nationwide 24-hour strike and tomorrow metal workers will strike factories and workplaces in protest to the government&rsquo;s widely unpopular austerity measures.

Bondgenoten Blocks Entrances of NL’s Social Affairs Ministry

The president of Colombian mining union Sintraminercol was the target of an assassination attempt 10 October as he was leaving his home in Bogot&aacute; with family members. Francisco Ramirez noticed gunmen on a motorcycle heading directly at him and he immediately took cover with his young girls behind a utility setting. The attempted killing comes at a time when the union is resisting the liquidation of state mining company Minercol, a move by the Uribe government to open the country&rsquo;s natural resources to global enterprises.

Colombia’s Mining Union President Target of Assassination

A 4-day strike paralyzed Nigeria the week of 11 October, and the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) is gearing for a second, heavier general strike aimed at getting the government to reverse a fuel price hike. A 2-week break in the strike ends this week and NLC leadership and leaders of the federation&rsquo;s 29 affiliates meet tomorrow to schedule another general strike if the government does not rescind September&rsquo;s 25% petrol hike.

Four-Day Nigerian General Strike Over Fuel Prices

Canadian affiliate CEP is challenging the decision by Finnish firm UPM Kymenne to shut a kraft pulp mill in Miramichi, New Brunswick. &ldquo;We have questions about this announcement and we are not getting logical answers,&rdquo; said the CEP&rsquo;s Max Michaud. Citing the union&rsquo;s recent decision to seek mediation in bargaining with the company. CEP also is concerned about wood source policies that hamper the mill and is asking the provincial government to investigate. Some 400 high-paying and family-supporting jobs are at stake in the rural community.

CEP in Canada Seeks to Keep Pulp Mill Open in New Brunswick

Archive

Asbestos: South Africans' Case Should Be Heard In Britain

James Hardie’s Executives Take Massive Severance Payouts

Four Unions Merge in Switzerland to Inform Unia

CEP’s Congress in Canada Moves on Providing HIV/AIDS Relief

Zimbabwe’s Miners Come to Terms’s with Chamber of Mines

Pakistan Labour Marches Against Government’s Labour Stand

Bondgenoten Blocks Entrances of NL’s Social Affairs Ministry

Colombia’s Mining Union President Target of Assassination

Four-Day Nigerian General Strike Over Fuel Prices

CEP in Canada Seeks to Keep Pulp Mill Open in New Brunswick

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