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Saturday 17 November 2007&nbsp; 
10.00 &ndash; 17.00 Women&rsquo;s Conference 
 
Sunday 18 November 2007 
09.30 &ndash; 17.00 Women&rsquo;s Conference 
 
Monday 19 November 2007&nbsp; 
09.00 &ndash; 17.30 Presidium 
19:00 Dinner for ICEM Presidium Members and accompanying persons 
 
Tuesday 20 November 2007&nbsp;&nbsp; 
09:00 - 17:00 Executive Committee Meeting 
19.00 Dinner for ICEM Executive Committee Members and accompanying persons 
 
Wednesday 21 November 2007&nbsp;&nbsp; 
09:00 - 17:00 Contract and Agency Labour Conference 
17.00+ Meeting of Congress Credentials Committee 
 
Thursday 22 November 2007&nbsp;&nbsp; 
10.00 Opening of Congress 
17.00 Congress Sessions close 
17:00+ WFIW Integration 
19.30 Dinner 
 
Friday 23 November 2007&nbsp;&nbsp; 
09:00 Congress Sessions continue 
17:30 Congress Sessions close 
19.00 Dinner 
 
Saturday 24 November 2007&nbsp;&nbsp; 
09:00 Final Congress Sessions 
14:00 Congress Closure 
15:00-17:00 New ICEM Presidium meets 
<a href="/en/?id=184&amp;doc=2430&amp;la=EN">Click here for the detailed draft 4th World Congress Agenda 
</a> 
Departure of Delegations

Provisional Programme for the Fourth ICEM World Congress

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On 19 May, ICEM&rsquo;s French affiliate F&eacute;d&eacute;chimie CGT-FO elected, unanimously, Herv&eacute; Quillet as its new general secretary at an extraordinary National Committee meeting. 
 
The new general secretary replaces long-serving and popular general secretary Michel Decayeux, who is retiring, but will remain on as a member of the organisation&rsquo;s Bureau F&eacute;d&eacute;ral as well as of its Commission Ex&eacute;cutive Conf&eacute;d&eacute;rale until the union&rsquo;s next congress. He also remains in charge of European and international relations. Decayeux is a former ICEM Materials Section chairman and an Executive Committee Member of the ICEM.

Michel Decayeux Steps Down as GS of Fédéchimie CGT-FO in France

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ICEM Norwegian affiliate NOPEF and other unions achieved a 2006 wage increase of 4.5% in the offshore oil sector. The accord came on 17 May after offshore workers rejected a 2.5% offer from the Oil Industry Association (OLF). 
 
The agreement covers 6,200 workers and also lays a framework for further dialogue on work conditions including the rising demand for skilled workers in Norway&rsquo;s offshore oil sector. A total of 2.4 million barrels of oil daily is pumped from rigs off the Norwegian continental shelf.

Norway’s Offshore Energy Workers Negotiate 4.5% Raise

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In Russia over the past ten days, three miners were killed and one is still missing in two separate accidents 
in the coal-rich Kuzbass area of central Siberia. The accidents involve the same company, Prokopyevskugol coal mines, a subsidiary of the metallurgical company Novo-Lipetsk. 
 
At the Voroshilovskaya mine the town of Prokopyevsk, a roof collapsed on 22 May, causing two deaths. Fifteen miners managed to escape. On 18 May at the Ziminka mine, one miner was killed when water broke through a clay wall. One other miner is still missing, while 12 managed to escape. 
 
The accidents prompted the governor of the Kemerovo Region of Russia, Vladimir Lisin, to write to the chairman of the board of Novo-Lipetsk to increase financing of measures to ensure proper industrial safety and mineworker protections.

Separate Mishaps, Same Company in Russian Coal Fatalities

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Two strikes in the Colombian coal mining sector broke out recently, giving 3,000 miners of unaffiliated Sintramienerg&eacute;tica a loud voice to express disapproval over working conditions in this resource-rich sector of the South American country. 
A strike by 1,000 miners broke out at Swiss-owned Glencore International&rsquo;s Carbones La Jagua operations in Jagua de Ibirico, Cesar state, on 17 May, and one numbering 2,000 miners started on 22 May at US-based Drummond Coal&rsquo;s LaLoma mines in Cesar, and spread to the company&rsquo;s transport and export terminal operations in Cienaga and Santa Marta. 
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The Drummond strike centers on subcontractors. The privately-held US company refuses to extend collective bargaining rights to thousands of contract workers, mostly at the transport and terminal sites. Sintramienerg&eacute;tica is insisting for these jobs to be made permanent, with full social rights as well as the necessary health care benefits both on and off the job. 
 
Wages are also a major issue with both companies, since coal&rsquo;s high prices and the rich value of Colombian&rsquo;s high-grade resource in America and Europe has left miners short-changed. Miners&rsquo; demands also include significant investment, particularly by Glencore, on environmental projects, and for both companies to begin providing medical assistance to communities that have been adversely affected by the mining enterprises. 
 
Columbia&rsquo;s national labour center, Central Unitaria de Trabajores (CUT), has warned that company security units have made the strike scenes extremely volatile, and has called for constructive dialogue from both the national government and the two companies. CUT, saying the two strikes are lawful, said the companies refused to find solutions to the union&rsquo;s demands over the past two months, and that the demands have the overwhelming support of the miners. 
Glencore recently sold its 33% share in another rich coal mining and export operation in eastern Colombia, Carbones del Cerrej&oacute;n, to Xstrata, a global mining house in which Glencore owns a 15% stake.

Colombia’s Coal Industry Hit with Two Strikes

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Baltic trade union solidarity was at its best last week when the Lithuanian Confederation of Trade Unions picketed and presented a formal letter of protest to the Estonian embassy in Vilnius, Lithuania. At the same time, on 25 May, Estonian trade union federations EAKL and TALO were demonstrating in the Estonian capital of Tallinn. 
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The joint protest is over the Estonian government&rsquo;s proposed Employees&rsquo; Representatives Act, put forward by the Social Affairs Ministry. If passed into law, the measure would exclude legitimate trade union representatives from information and consultation procedures inside worksites, as well as give employers the leverage to sack trade union delegates. 
 
EAKL Chairman Harri Taliga said the proposed legislation was shaped only with the narrow interests of employers in mind. The ICEM has written to Estonian Prime Minister Andrus Ansip to express concern with the bill, specifically citing it with violating ILO Conventions 98 and 135, as well as a European Union directive on trade union rights.

Lithuanian Labour Protests Estonia’s Anti-Union Legislation

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A five-day glass plant strike in Bulgaria by ICEM affiliate National Federation of Chemical Workers of Podkrepa ended 19 May. Some 700 workers, the majority of them members of the union, won a 17% increase in their total financial package, including a 10% raise in their basic salary. 
 
The strike action occurred at Turkish-owned Sisecam&rsquo;s Trakya Glass Bulgaria (Shishejam), a new facility that only went into production in February 2006 in the town of Targovishte. The Chemical Workers&rsquo; Union had conducted a one-hour protest outside the factory on 8 May over local management&rsquo;s refusal to address several issues. 
The flat-glass plant is the second of three plants that Sisecam has opened recently in Targovishte. A household glass plant opened for production in August 2005, while a potassium-glass plant and mirror operation will open in the northern Bulgarian town late in 2006.

Glass Strike Ends in Bulgaria with Wage Gains

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ICEM Turkish affiliate Petrol-Īş&rsquo;s efforts to block, through several lawsuits, the 51% sale of state-owned oil refiner Turkiye Petro Rafinerisi AS (T&Uuml;PRAS) produced another court victory on 23 May. 
The Ankara Administrative Court cancelled sale of the 14.76% minority stake to Israeli investor Sami Ofer on the grounds that the sale did not benefit the &ldquo;public good.&rdquo; Ofer&rsquo;s bid of US$446 million last year for a minority stake in T&Uuml;PRAS had ballooned into a potential US$1.2 billion investment due to the revaluation of the state company. 
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On 2 February 2006, a preliminary ruling by the Council of State judiciary panel blocked the controlling stake in a privatised T&Uuml;PRAS when it ruled against the purchase by a consortium made up of Turkey&rsquo;s Koc Holdings and Royal Dutch Shell. That ruling was issued on the basis that privatisation laws had not been adhered to. 
The ruling, however, was vacated when no further court action occurred by a 29 March deadline. Petrol- Īş will now challenge this privatisation matter before the General Council of Administrative Courts. 
 
The union will also continue its public campaign against the sale of T&Uuml;PRAS, and likely will engage in further industrial actions at the company&rsquo;s four refineries and petrochemical plant. Petrol- Īş has also made application on the matter before the European Court of Human Rights.

Petrol-Īş Wins Yet Another Court Round Involving TÜPRAS Privatisation

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Pharmaceutical workers, members of US affiliate United Steel Workers (USW), were locked out off their jobs by Medco Health Solutions on 5 April. Some 500 pharmacy technicians at Medco's prescription mail-order business in Las Vegas, Nevada, are faced with an illegal and unilateral reduction of health care benefits. 
The lockout has been deemed illegal when the US National Labor Relations Board issued an unfair labour practice complaint against the company on 31 March for retaliating against technicians who took part in solidarity actions, protesting the health care cuts. 
Some 25% of the company's prescription business is done through union-sponsored health care plans, and Medco itself admits that six million union workers in the US are covered under Medco prescription plans. The USW has mounted a campaign among unions tied to those plans to protest directly to the Medco's CEO.

Union Prescription Drug Provider Locks Out USW Members in US

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National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) affiliated workers demonstrated in South Africa on April 4, protesting against potential plans by DeBeers to close its Koffiefontein mine in the southern Free State.
Handing a memorandum to the management of the mine, the workers were given a promise by the employer that they would be answered. According to the NUM Chairperson, Joseph Botile, closing the mine would mean making Koffiefontein into a ghost town. DeBeers is virtually the only employer in the area, providing income for almost 600 people and their families. With all these jobs gone, it would become impossible for the NUM Workers to support their families.

South African NUM Workers Demonstrate at DeBeers Koffiefontein Mine

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