Solidarity Center - Category: Workers & Human Rights

Guatemalan Farmer’s Murder Reveals Vast Employer Theft

Jul 25, 2017

The recent murder of a retired Guatemalan farmer and the violent attack against two others while holding a peaceful protest at their former employer, the San Gregorio Piedra Parada Farm, revealed a decades-long failure by the agribusiness to pay into the country’s social protection fund—shorting workers some 1.2 billion quetzals ($165,270).

Guatemala, Eugenio Lopez, farmer, murder, human rights, Solidarity Center

Eugenio López, 72, was murdered at the farm of his former employer during a peaceful gathering of senior citizens seeking unpaid pension benefits. Credit: Courtesy, Comité de Unidad Campesina

Eugenio López, 72, was murdered June 23 and two others injured when they were fired upon during a peaceful gathering of mostly senior citizens who have been unable to receive their health and pension benefits from the Guatemalan Social Security Institute (IGSS) because San Gregorio has not paid into the fund since 1998, even though it deducted workers’ contributions to the fund.

The protest was spearheaded by the United Committee of Rural Farmers (Comité de Unidad Campesina, CUC) which has been fighting for the retirement benefits of 240 retired workers at the farm, 16 miles outside Coatepeque. Union leaders say other agricultural employers also withhold payment for workers’ retirement.

No one has been charged with the murder. Few murders of Guatemalan union leaders and members are resolved. The International Labor Organization is holding hearings on the assassination of 84 trade unionists in Guatemala, most with impunity. The Guatemalan government maintains that none of the 84 union murders are related to their union activity.

Guatemala is one of the most dangerous places in the world for worker rights activists, with 51 incidents of anti-union violence documented and verified in between 2015 and 2016, and five incidents so far in 2017, according to a report by the Worker Rights Defenders Network of Guatemala.

The network condemned the murder and its statement is supported by a range of labor rights and other human rights groups, including: the National Council of Displaced Persons of Guatemala, the Mayan and Rural Farmer Organization, Nim Ajpu Association of Mayan Lawyers and Notaries and the Social and Popular Assembly and the Women’s Political Alliance.

The World Organization Against Torture (OMCT), the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and others issued statements and sent letters to the Guatemalan government in response to the Guatemalan union network and its allies call for support and advocacy.

Falsely Convicted Uzbek Union Activist Dies in Prison

Jun 23, 2017

A prominent Uzbek worker rights activist, falsely accused and jailed in 2014, died almost six months ago in prison—with news of his death only reaching the public this week.

Nuraddin Jumaniyozov, who was serving a nine-year term following a conviction for “human trafficking,” died December 31, 2016, according to the Uzbek-German Forum. Prison authorities claim Jumaniyozov died of tuberculosis.

“Mr. Jumaniyozov’s death in prison, away from his family and loved ones, is a tragedy. It shows the lengths the government of Uzbekistan will go to prevent anyone from building a truly independent union representing any group of workers, especially those who are most oppressed,” said Rudy Porter, director of Solidarity Center programs in Europe and Central Asia.

Uzbekistan has made a practice of violence, torture and politically motivated imprisonment to deal with dissent and civil-society activism. It also is the largest state organizer of forced labor in the world, as it drives public-sector workers into the cotton fields each fall to harvest.

Jumaniyozov’s arrest and subsequent trial, alongside fellow worker rights activist Fahriddin Tillayev, was widely condemned as an orchestrated move to silence the labor movement. Prior to their incarceration, the two had been active in organizing day laborers and migrant workers, who have fled unemployment in rural areas for Tashkent, the capital, and other large cities.

Under Uzbek law, day laborers and migrant workers lack many of the legal protections afforded to other workers, leaving them vulnerable to exploitation and unsafe employment. To solve this injustice, Jumaniyozov and Tillayev were working to establish an independent trade union for day laborers before they were arrested in January 2014.

Before their imprisonment, Jumaniyozov and Tillayev were targeted for their activism. In 2012 and 2013, they were detained and fined on multiple occasions, as their organizing work was gaining ground. Tillayev remains in custody, serving a 10-year sentence. The Cotton Campaign, of which the Solidarity Center is a member, is condemning Jumaniyozov’s unnecessary death and demanding the release of Tillayev.

Freedom of association is severely curtailed Uzbekistan, though the government last year ratified the International Labor Organization’s Convention No. 87, which recognizes freedoms of association and the protection of the right to organize. All Uzbek trade unions are organized under the state-controlled Council of the Federation of Trade Unions. Workers attempting to establish unions independent of the federation—or to educate others on their right to do so—have experienced brutal reprisals.

Forced labor activist Elena Urlaeva was detained in a psychiatric hospital by government officials as recently as March this year, and previously had been arrested, beaten and imprisoned. Human rights activist Dimitry Tikhonov was beaten by the police last year while documenting forced labor in Uzbekistan’s cotton fields and returned home in March of this year to find his home office burned, which he said destroyed all records relevant to his human rights work, including forced labor.

Dangerous Work: Attacks on Journalists Increase

May 3, 2017

A free press is a hallmark of democracy. Yet around the world, journalists are under threat for doing their job, risking their lives to report the news, ask difficult questions and hold the corrupt to account. According to an International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) study released for World Press Freedom Day, “journalists face killings, attacks, violence, bans and intimidation on a daily basis” around the world.

At its most extreme, the assault on journalism leads to murder, often with impunity. According to the IFJ, 93 journalists were killed in 2016, and 13 in the opening months of 2017. Over the last decade, most murdered journalists were local reporters covering politics and corruption, notes the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), with about a third of them “first taken captive, the majority of whom were tortured, amplifying the killers’ message of intimidation to the media community.”

Mexico is one of the most dangerous places in the world for journalists, says the CPJ. Since 2010, more than 50 media workers were murdered or disappeared. The country ranks sixth on CPJ’s “Impunity Index,” which tracks the number of unsolved journalist murders as a percentage of population, in nations with five or more unsolved cases. Ahead of it are primarily countries in conflict: Somalia, Iraq, Syria, the Philippines and South Sudan.

Women journalists—targeted for their job as well as their gender—face additional challenges, including harassment and threats in the field, at the office and online. A soon-to-be-published survey of 214 women journalists in Pakistan, conducted by the Solidarity Center and Civic Action Resources, says that when women journalists are sexually harassed, “social taboos, segregation and stigma keep them

from speaking openly about it and seeking support. Since Pakistan is an honor-based society, any attack on a woman’s reputation can have serious repercussions for her, both professionally and personally.” The Solidarity Center works with Pakistani journalists—women and men—to achieve gender equality at the workplace and in the stories they report.

The CPJ also noted that a record number of media workers—259—were jailed in 2016. Nonetheless, journalists and their unions are taking a stand against rising authoritarianism and increasing restrictions on their ability to work. Around the world, reports the IFJ journalists’ unions are submitting formal protests to national and regional human rights bodies, advancing legal challenges and staging actions—from strikes to protests—“to defend media freedom and the rights of journalists.”

Online Tribute to Earl Brown

Mar 28, 2017

A moving online tribute to Earl V. Brown, Jr., includes remembrances from family, friends and colleagues whose lives Brown touched around the world and features a video of the March 25 memorial service commemorating Brown’s deep dedication to achieving worker justice.

Brown, Solidarity Center labor and employment law counsel, was a passionate civil-rights champion, tireless defender of workers and brilliant intellect who passed away in February following a brief illness.

A poem on the memorial site by Langston Hughes, one of Brown’s favorite poets, embodies Brown’s passion for justice, with the words “Freedom is a strong seed, planted in a great need”—a fitting description of Brown’s life work seeding justice, freedom and dignity for workers and marginalized peoples everywhere.

Thailand Drops Charges against Rights Defenders

Mar 2, 2017

The global labor and human rights communities welcomed news that Thailand’s military on Tuesday withdrew criminal complaints against three human rights activists who recently documented torture in the country’s three southern provinces, and announced plans to work with human rights groups to further verify human rights violations and reduce their occurrence.

The charges proposed by Thailand’s public prosecutor against Somchai Hom La-or, Pornpen Khongkachonkiet and Anchana Heemmina on criminal defamation and computer crimes had carried a maximum penalty of seven years’ imprisonment plus fines of up to 300,000 baht ($8,330).

Thailand’s Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC) had filed a complaint against the three in May 2016, claiming the reputation of the army was damaged by allegations in, “Torture and Ill Treatment in Thailand’s Deep South,” a report published in February 2016 describing 54 cases of alleged torture by the Royal Thai Police and Royal Thai Army. The Cross Cultural Foundation (CrCF) and Duay Jai Group, two human rights groups, published the report.

Pramote Prom-in, spokesman for the ISOC, said the charges were dropped because they “want cooperation between NGOs and officials to be able to move forward in the future.”

ISOC says it will work with civil-society groups to verify reports about rights violations, reduce abuses using a new: ”joint committee” to verify accusations, and design mechanisms to prevent future abuses.

The global labor and human rights communities continue to urge the Thai government to amend the nation’s penal code to remove criminal penalties for defamation.

Hom La-or, a CrCF advisor, is founder and secretary-general of the Human Rights and Development Foundation (HRDF), a Solidarity Center partner that focuses on migrant worker rights. He has actively defended human rights in Thailand for decades, since the start of the country’s modern human rights movement. In October 1973, while studying for a law degree from Thammasat University, Somchai Hom La-or became a leader in the mass student-led protests against the military dictatorship that had ruled the country for over a decade.

Pornpen Khongkachonkiet is director of CrCF, which assists marginalized communities, especially torture victims and their families in Southern Thailand, access justice. Anchana Heemmina is founder and director of Duay Jai Group (Hearty Support Group), and Patani Human Rights Organization Network.

“[W]e will not back down from exposing rights violations,” Somchai Hom La-or said last year after being charged with defamation. “For a conflict-ridden region like the deep south, we need to expose human rights violations to bring true peace.”