English

Español

Français

Aerospace

Automotive

Base metals

Chemical, pharmaceutical and bio-science

Energy

Glass, cement, ceramic and associated industries

ICT, electrical and electronics

Mechanical Engineering

Mining and DGOJP

Pulp and paper

Rubber

Shipbuilding and shipbreaking

Textile, garment, shoes, leather and textile services

Sectors

Action on textile and garment industry

Clean up shipbreaking

Ratify ILO C176

United for a just future - time to pay up!

Disinvest from Myanmar

Action Plan 2021-2025

Global Framework Agreements

Union building

Women

Youth

White-collar workers

Health & safety

Industry 4.0

Just Transition

Organizing with industriALL

What we do

Affiliates

Statutes

Elected Officials

Executive Committee

Geneva head office

South East Asia

Eastern Europe, Central Asia and the Caucasus

Latin America and the Caribbean

Middle East and North Africa

South Asia

Regional offices

About us

Global worker No1 2022

Global worker No2 2022

Publications

Resources

Press

<img height="39" src="" width="100" alt="" />
At the Fifth Meeting of the Brazilian national network of trade unions at Dutch-based Akzo Nobel plants from 15-17 July in S&atilde;o Paulo, union representatives from British-based ICI chemical facilities joined the network. Akzo Nobel recently acquired ICI. 
 
The expansion of the network is expected to further the links of solidarity between workers of the two companies in Brazil. 
 
The 25 union representatives present came from plants located in Recife, Santo Andr&eacute;, Mau&aacute;, S&atilde;o Bernardo do Campo, Jundia&iacute;, Itupeva, S&atilde;o Roque, S&atilde;o Paulo, Bahia, Guarulhos, and Rio de Janeiro. 
 
The network meeting opened with a presentation by the Brazilian national centre CUT on a multinational project surrounding the ABC Chemical Workers&rsquo; Union&rsquo;s Project of Life programme. That deals with the demands of life, health, and work, and introduces actions to ensure a better work environment. 
 
The coordinator of the network, Sergio Carrasso, then delivered a report on activities of the network since its inception in 2003. That was followed by the results of a survey done by the Social Observatory Network on working conditions at Akzo Nobel.
<img height="167" src="" width="380" alt="" />
&nbsp; 
The survey reflects a positive outcome through collective negotiations, with workers of Akzo Nobel in Brazil managing to establish better social dialogue practices in which civil rights have been guaranteed and wage differentials bridged. 
 
ICI trade unionists attending made a presentation on their individual plants, including numbers of workers, length of work days, discrimination problems, and social dialogue and corporate social responsibility experiences. 
 
The mid-July network meetings also served as preparation for the Third National Social Dialogue forum of Brazilian unions with Akzo Nobel. The network meeting concluded with a visit to the S&atilde;o Bernardo do Campo plant. 
 
Akzo Nobel workers pledged to continue seeking contacts with workers of the company in Mexico and The Netherlands.

Brazilian Akzo Nobel Workers’ Network Brings in ICI Plants for Effective Solidarity

<img height="39" alt="" src="" width="100" />
&nbsp;The ICEM lodged a stern protest with the government of Turkey following excessive police force to quell a peaceful protest by ICEM affiliate Belediye-İş, the Municipal and General Workers&rsquo; Union. Due to stalled negotiations on behalf of 10,000 union members at different segments of the Istanbul Metropolitan Muncipality, the union issued a 60-day strike notice in mid-July. 
 
On 17 July, 2,000 Belediye-İş members, along with officials of the union, marched to an administrative building of the municipality to hang a banner announcing their legal strike. They were immediately repelled by police, using pepper spray and pressurized water cannons. 
 
The police force was a reminder of the force used on 1 May this year when trade unionists attempted to lay flowers at Istanbul&rsquo;s Taksim Square in memorial to the 37 comrades killed there by government forces on 1 May 1977.
<img height="199" alt="" src="" width="300" />
Police Water Cannons Impede Peaceful&nbsp;Belediye-İş March on 17 July 

&ldquo;The attitude taken by police against peaceful demonstrators reinforces the impression and opinion worldwide on your government&rsquo;s pursuit against (workers&rsquo; rights),&rdquo; wrote ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. 
 
&ldquo;Although Turkey has ratified ILO Conventions 87 and 98, we understand that neither in law or in daily life can these standards be freely exercised.&rdquo; 
 
The strike notice was issued because the Istanbul Metropolitan Muncipality has closed the door on negotiations after offering only an 8% increase. Belediye-İş is seeking a 40% increase. According to the union, daily consumer costs have rapidly escalated beyond the high inflation rate in Turkey, with water and transportation increases nearing the 35% mark.

ICEM Protests Police Force to Break up Belediye-İş Strike Call in Turkey

&nbsp;<img height="39" alt="" src="" width="100" />
Today, in Bogot&aacute;, Colombia, civil society and trade unions, led by the ICEM electric utility affiliate Sintraelecol, will mark the 25th anniversary of the Guavio dam disaster in which most of the 200 casualities were&nbsp;temporary labourers. They were buried alive when a&nbsp;pair of massive rock slides, totalling 60,000 cubic yards of earth,&nbsp;fell on them&nbsp;in the evening of 28 July 1983. 
 
The day has been designated as not only a Day of Remembrance by&nbsp;ICEM's Latin America/Caribbean Region, but also as a day to push for full labour rights, including safety and health, for contract and agency workers. 
 
The memorial event and symposium&nbsp;will be held at the Hotel del Parque, 23-24 Carrera 5A, Bogot&aacute;, beginning at 14h00. 
 
&ldquo;Today is a tribute to the casual workers and others&nbsp;who passed away in 1983 while they were constructing one of the most important energy projects in our country,&rdquo; said ICEM Colombia Coordinator Carlos Bustos. &ldquo;It is also a call to non-permanent workers and agency staff everywhere to join with labour unions for decent work and a guarantee of protection under established global labour standards.&rdquo;
<img height="126" alt="" src="" width="294" />
Construction of the 820-foot rock-fill dam, the tallest in the Americas,&nbsp;began in August 1981 by Empresa de Energia Electrica de Bogot&aacute;, the electric power company of Colombia's capital city. Between the towns of Ubal&aacute; and M&aacute;mbita, 120 kilometres northeast of Bogot&aacute;, the utility had purchased 2,000 estates from landowners in order to build the continent's&nbsp;biggest hydroelectic dam, one&nbsp;that would generate one million kilowatts of power.
In September 1982, a precursor of what was to come occurred when four miners were killed from a rock slide.
During&nbsp;the spring of 1983, when construction&nbsp;was in full swing,&nbsp;heavy rains set in on the&nbsp;the Bocatoma Valley in the department of Cundinamarca. 

The US$1.3 billion dam project, on the Guavio River, had the financial support of the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank. March through May, 1983, also saw a 48-day strike by workers against the joint contractors, Rome-headquartered Vianini Lavori Spa and Madrid-based Entrecanles y Tavora. The&nbsp;strike saw the Colombian military&nbsp;called in.
<img height="181" alt="" src="" width="180" />
At 10h00 on 28 July, while boring was underway on a power tunnel and a separate water diversion&nbsp;tunnel,&nbsp;eight workers were slightly injured when a massive rock was dislodged and fell inside the adjacent tunnels. A safety alarm drew the attention of the industrial security team, but after inspection, the area was declared&nbsp;safe for work. Meanwhile, rain continued to ravage the Andes mountainside outside.&nbsp; 
 
At 19h00, pipefitters, electrical pump installers, and other skilled workers were leaving the project&rsquo;s front on buses,&nbsp;their work day complete. Left behind to mine the tunnels overnight were some 100-plus casual labourers, including many teen-age boys. 
 
In the words of one pump installer, who recalls looking back on the worksite&nbsp;from a base camp, the illimination of lights was brilliant. And then seconds later, &ldquo;the lights went dark.&rdquo; Some of the&nbsp;workers, along with rescues teams,&nbsp;began hurrying back to the project&rsquo;s front in buses, only to have a second&nbsp;landslide bury three buses alongside the tunnels. 
 
Buried inside were 138 workers, with&nbsp;another 40 workers crushed to death when the buses they were in&nbsp;became encapsulated by falling&nbsp;rock. Approximately 20 local residents, who were assisting work in one manner or another, also perished inside the tunnels.
The bodies of only one-half of the victims were&nbsp;recovered.&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 
The Guavio&nbsp;dam was finally&nbsp;completed in 1988, two years behind scheduled. In 1997, the Spanish company Endesa purchased the hydro-generating operation. 
 
The ICEM salutes its Colombian affiliate, Sintraelecol, with commemorating the 25th anniversary of a disaster that should never&nbsp;have happened, as well as all Latin American/Caribbean trade unions and NGOs who are participating in today&rsquo;s event.

Colombia Dam Disaster of 28 July 1983: ‘The Night the Lights Went Dark’ on 200 Casual Workers

&nbsp;<img height="39" alt="" src="" width="100" />
Forty-one national mining unions from 37 countries met 9-11 July in St. Petersburg, Russia, for the ICEM&rsquo;s quadrennial World Conference on Mining and DJGOP. A total of 138 delegates addressed the major changes occurring in the industry. 
 
At the top of the agenda of an ICEM work plan covering the next four years was the continuing health and safety problems occurring at mines throughout the world. 
 
&ldquo;At a time of unprecedented profits in the mining industry, it is an unacceptable situation that much of this profit continues to be stained with the blood of miners,&rdquo; said Senzeni Zokwana, ICEM President and also President of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) in South Africa.
<img height="173" alt="" src="" width="140" />
ICEM President Senzeni Zokwana&nbsp;
Although there are no worldwide figures on mining injuries and fatalities, serious accidents continue to plague mining operations in more developed countries, such as the US and South Africa, as well as in developing nations. South African-based Gold Fields Ltd., the world&rsquo;s fourth largest gold-mining house, was specifically cited for operating dangerous mines and may be a target of ICEM action. 
 
ICEM affiliates attending the Mining Conference approved a continued global campaign for ratification of ILO Convention 196, the Safety and Health in Mines Convention. Delegates also approved action to assist uranium miners in Africa in preventing exposure to dangerous radiation. 
 
A further focus to the conference was the continued vertical and horizontal consolidation in the mining and metals industries and the growing power of multinational corporations, including emergent multinational mining companies based in Brazil, China, India, and Russia. Delegates pledged to work together to build networks to confront these companies. 
 
Also designated as part of the work plan was the development of a policy on sustainable development, including support for developing clean coal technologies, challenging the use of contract and agency labour and gaining work rights for such workers, and establishing closer relationships with NGOs that show support for workers. 
 
Featured at the conference was a presentation on the fight between the Mexican mineworkers&rsquo; union, known as Los Mineros, and Grupo M&eacute;xico and the government of Mexico, which has attempted to destroy the union. ICEM affiliates pledged full support to the miners and a stepped up campaign against this company and the government. 
The ICEM mining report can be found <a href="/wp-content/migration/icem/2008ICEMMiningReportEN.pdf">here</a>.

ICEM Holds Quadrennial Mining Conference in Russia

<img height="39" alt="" src="" width="100" />
On 13 August, in the northern Colombian city of Baranquilla, the right-wing paramilitary group &ldquo;Black Eagles&rdquo; issued a communiqu&eacute; calling for death to community activists and trade union leaders, most notably a union leader in ICEM mining affiliate Sintracarb&ograve;n. He is Adolfo Llanos. 
 
The ICEM strongly denounced the cowardly acts in a letter to the Colombian government and the three MNCs that control worksites in which Sintracarb&ograve;n represents coal miners, and transport and port workers. The ICEM demanded greater security for trade union leaders in the letter, and for the government to apprehend and convict those responsible.
<img height="220" alt="" src="" width="160" />
ICEM Gen. Sec. Manfred Warda
&ldquo;It must now be the obligation and responsibility of the government, in close cooperation with the management of Carbones del Cerej&oacute;n, to ensure the safety for all the people on this death list,&rdquo; wrote ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda. &ldquo;We take this vile and cowardly letter seriously and we hope you do as well, particularly in view of the fact that the 22 March 2008 murder of Sintracarb&ograve;n activist Adolfo Gonz&aacute;lez Montes has gone unsolved.&rdquo; 
 
Gonz&aacute;lez Montes was a committeeman for the Barrancas mining section of Sintracarb&ograve;n. He was murdered early in the morning of 22 March prior to his work turn at his home in Riohacha. Before his murder, multiple assailants tortured him in front of his four children, and immediately following the murder, other leaders of Sintracarb&ograve;n received telephone death threats.
<img height="101" alt="" src="" width="220" />
Adolfo Llanos is a union leader at Puerto Bolivar, Cerrej&oacute;n&rsquo;s deep-water coal export port on the Caribbean coast. Carbones del Cerrej&oacute;n is one of the world&rsquo;s largest open pit coal mining firms, equally owned by AngloAmerican, BHP Billiton, and Xstrata. 
 
The Colombian government has maintained that the Aquilas Negras, or &ldquo;Black Eagles,&rdquo; no longer exists. But leaders of other unions have received death threats from the paramilitary group, including the food and beverage trade union Sinaltraninal late last year.

ICEM Demands Greater Security for Sintracarbòn Unionists in Recent Colombian Death Threats

<img height="39" alt="" src="" width="100" />
Focused militancy coupled with poised negotiating gave 325 workers of German industrial gas company Linde in Thailand a solid 31-month collective agreement. The Thai Industrial Gas Local Union (TIGLU), aligned with ICEM affiliate Petroleum and Chemical Workers&rsquo; Federation of Thailand, won major gains at 10 chemical plants in a negotiated agreement reached late last week. 
 
On 22 July, in the first round of collective negotiations, local management claimed they had no authority to address the union&rsquo;s 16 demands. Even at a 28 July tripartite bargaining session in a provincial labour office in Saraburi, management refused to take the demands.
<img height="233" alt="" src="" width="350" />
Last Week's Bargaining, TIGLU Committee in Foreground
TIGLU then conducted extraordinary meetings at different worksites where strike authorization was put to a ballot. As important, the union reached out to the ICEM and to German affiliate IGBCE, insisting that parent Linde instruct local management to bargain in good faith. 
 
A strike by two-thirds of the combined workforce started on 6 August, and lasted only four days. A commitment was gained quickly and honest talks began on 11 August. Those talks produced the first written agreement between TIGLU and the company. That happened last Friday, 22 August. In the binding pact, the union scored major gains on 10 of the 16 demands. They also won agreement that the remaining items would be addressed by joint union-management committees.
<img height="234" alt="" src="" width="350" />
&nbsp;TIGLU Workers on Strike, 8 August
TIGLU won important contractual commitments on contract labour, giving contract workers the right to full-time and permanent work after time periods. Effective 1 January 2009, a union dues check-off system will be put in place by the company, and Linde&rsquo;s management agreed to begin giving 39 scholarships for children of workers, ranging from elementary school age to post high-school age. 
 
TIGLU also achieved paid union leave, training courses for all workers on their rights, benefits, and entitlements, and increased health care benefits. That increases to 40,000 baht per year, the equivalent of &euro;750. 
 
They also won Providence Fund increases of up to 10% of salary for workers with 15 years service or more, and 5% increases for workers with less than five years. 
 
The ICEM congratulates the members of TIGLU for their energy, integrity, and ability to use social dialogue to post benefits and work rule improvements for Linde workers in Thailand.

Thai Industrial Gas Workers Win Through Striking, Engagement in Earnest Bargaining Table Talks

<img height="39" src="" width="100" alt="" />
Trade unions the world over are encouraged to apply for the remaining spots in the 2008-2009 master course offerings of the Global Labour University, to be held in Germany, India, Brazil, South Africa. 
 
Forms and information can be found&nbsp;<a href="http://www.global-labour-university.org/">here</a>. 
 
The programme offered at Germany&rsquo;s University of Kassel and Berlin School of Economics centres on global governance and macroeconomics; the programme at the Tata Institute in Mumbai, India, deals with the informal economy; the curriculum at the University of Witwaterstand, Johannesburg, South Africa, is the politics of development; while at Universidade Estadual de Campinas (Unicamp), S&atilde;o Paulo State, the focus is on transational companies.
<img height="91" src="" width="98" alt="" />
The Global Labour University is an initiative of the ILO, global trade unions, academic institutions, and foundations. ACTRAV, the ILO Bureau for Workers&rsquo; Activities, offers scholarships to trade unionists from developing nations and transitional economies. Applicants must have the endrosement from a trade union to apply.

Applications Closing Fast for Admission to 2008-2009 Global Labour University

<img height="39" alt="" src="" width="100" />
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) of the UK has issued a cautionary warning on the number of hydrocarbon releases in the offshore oil and gas industries. Such releases are considered precursors for major accidents. 
 
The concern comes just five weeks after British trade unions and civil society commemorated the 20-year anniversary of the deadly Piper Alpha offshore disaster, in which 167 oil workers were killed. 
 
Figures released by the UK's HSE reveal that there has been no improvement in the number of hydrocarbon releases in 2007-2008. Some 517 dangerous incidents were reported in that period, 40% of which were hydrocarbon releases.
<img height="69" alt="" src="" width="139" border="1" />
The statistics, released by the HSE on 13 August, show that there was also an increase in the number of serious injuries in the offshore sector in 2007-2008 from the prior year. There were 44, compared to 39 in 2006-2007. Although for the first time in three years there were no fatalities in the offshore sector, there were 12 deaths in marine operations tied to offshore work. That included eight seamen who perished in April 2007 when the Norwegian anchor-handling tug supply vessel Bourbon Dolphin sunk in UK waters off the Shetland Islands. 
 
HSE Executive Judith Hackitt said the statistics are a reminder &ldquo;that we are far from being in a position where we can feel comfortable. On the failure to reduce the number of hydrocarbon releases, plus the increase in recorded dangerous incidents, she said the obvious implication is &ldquo;that basic safety systems are not being followed.&rdquo; 
 
UK&rsquo;s worst offshore disaster in the UK occurred on 6 July 1988 during Occidental Petroleum&rsquo;s Piper Alpha platform blasts. The 167 workers killed were caught in a hellish series of explosions lasting 75 minutes that many blamed on lax management control systems.

UK’s Health, Safety Executive Issues Warning on Offshore Hydrocarbon Releases

<img height="39" src="" width="100" alt="" />
The mining company Rio Tinto has been identified by the Australian labour movement as a major obstacle in stopping the use of AWAs, the draconian individual work agreements made to order by the ousted Howard government in order to weaken workers&rsquo; rights. 
 
And ICEM affiliate Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) is taking on the company squarely for trying to renew Australian Work Agreements (AWAs) with railroad workers at Pilbara Rail Services, a key Rio subsidiary in its lucrative western iron ore business. 
 
The CFMEU is seeking authorization from the Industrial Relations Commission to hold a secret ballot election in order to take industrial action, a move geared to rid rail workers of AWAs in favour of real collective agreements. Getting such legal sanction in West Australia is aimed at forcing Rio Tinto to the bargaining table.
<img height="70" src="" width="140" alt="" />
The union is similarly running campaigns to persuade BHP Billiton iron ore workers in the west to toss away AWAs, as well as Xstrata coal miners in the north. 
 
The Labour Government of Kevin Rudd, in March, passed a new law that scrapped John Howard&rsquo;s WorkChoices, but major companies are using loopholes in the new law to continue offering AWAs. 
 
Australian Council of Trade Unions President Sharan Burrow said &ldquo;there has been clear evidence that (telecommunications company) Telstra, Rio Tinto, Cochlear, and other major companies are still exploiting&rdquo; the loopholes. The ICEM stands with the CFMEU and asks that all miners in Australia refuse AWAs, and demand ironclad collective agreements with their employers.

Rio Tinto Test Awaits to Get Mining Firm to Discontinue Individual Work Agreements

<img height="39" alt="" src="" width="100" />
The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) in South Africa has hit hard on four deaths within a week at AngloGold and AngloPlatinum, pivotal proof that the country is in need of rigid safety regulations that hopefully will become law late this year. 
 
During a week spanning 12 August to 17 August, safety performances by both AngloGold and AngloPlats sunk at the same time the Chamber of Mines lobbied against tougher criminal penalties and corporate liabilities. Those arguments came in discussions during public hearings of the proposed Mine Health and Safety Amendment Bill. A Chamber of Mines leader said such measures would undermine CEOs in their current focus on workplace safety. 
 
At AngloGold, one worker was killed underground on 12 August in a mine collapse at Mponeng, while at TauTona, another miner was killed similarly, and two others were seriously injured. This happened on 15 August. At AngloPlats, majority owned by AngloAmerican, a company that sacked an AngloPlats CEO over safety performance, a fatality occurred at the Mogalakwena mine (16 August) and the Amandabult mine (18 August).
<img height="199" alt="" src="" width="140" />
NUM Gen. Sec. Frans Baleni&nbsp;
AngloGold workers set up a Day of Mourning for 21 August, but it was met with a company &ldquo;no work, no pay&rdquo; rule, which infuriated the national NUM. &ldquo;It is within our African culture to mourn and workers will continue to mourn for their deceased colleagues whether or not&rdquo; the industry accepts the practice, said NUM General Secretary Frans Baleni. 
 
AngloGold shut production at one of the two mines stricken by the worker fatalities, but AngloPlats continued production at both its mines. The NUM is pushing enactment of reform legislation that would lift maximum fines from R200,000 to R1 million on mining deaths, as well as place criminal liabilities on company officials.
<img height="84" alt="" src="" width="140" />
Also in the NUM, a near month-long strike by 700 miners at UK-based Petra Diamonds Ltd.&rsquo;s Heman mine ended on 19 August when the nation&rsquo;s second largest diamond producer significantly rised wages. The company admitted during the strike that even though its wage offer was near the inflation rate of 12%, its wage proposal would still not lift salaries to national mining averages. 
 
In other South African mining news, Energy and Minerals Minister Buyelwa Sonjica emphatically blasted activists who are attempting to block a titanium mining venture in the country&rsquo;s remote western coastal regions. Speaking in favour of a project by the Australian company Minerals Resource Commodities and its South African subsidiary, Transworld Energy and Minerals, she said those opposing the project now should examine their own apartheid-era disinterest before they take up the mantle community activists.

NUM Protests Rash of AngloGold, AngloPlats Mine Deaths in South Africa

Archive