To order the ICFTU Report on Activities and Financial
Reports, 1991-1994. This document is from the ICFTU Report on Activities and Financial Reports, 1991-1994.
To order the ICFTU Report on Activities and Financial
Reports, 1991-1994.
Human and Trade Union Rights Committee
Annual Survey of Violations of Trade Union Rights
Building International Solidarity
International Labour Organisation (ILO)
United Nations Commission on Human Rights
United Nations World Conference on Human Rights
The ICFTU 15th World Congress (Caracas, March 1992) urged that higher priority be given to long-standing concerns of human and trade union rights. This recommendation was given a specific framework with the development of a more comprehensive ICFTU programme on trade union rights. The creation of a single Committee on Human and Trade Union Rights greatly assisted in sharpening the ICFTU's focus on rights issues internationally and facilitated the development of new, action-oriented, strategies and programmes.
In the period under review, violations of trade union rights were on the rise throughout the world. A major portion of the ICFTU's task in defending trade union rights was already familiar to affiliates and made up much of the department's daily work load. Reports of violations of, or threats to, basic rights arrived frequently from affiliates, ITS or non-governmental rights organisations.
An average of two or three new cases were acted upon daily through letters of protest to officials of the violating country or the employer, by requesting committee members and others to co-ordinate solidarity action, or by preparing a detailed case to be submitted to the ILO. However, it was considered essential that the ICFTU's work on rights went beyond defensive reaction to violations and began to build a solid international foundation from which it could take the offensive.
The creation of a Department of Trade Union Rights as part of the October 1992 ICFTU restructuring assured that greater, more systematic attention was given to this area of activity. While the ICFTU had always been active in the defence of trade union rights, it was now able to develop a more comprehensive action programme, wider in scope and content than had been feasible in the past. In addition to extensive routine tasks, new activities were introduced. These included biannual meetings of the Human and Trade Union Rights Committee, developing a worldwide rights correspondents' network, a more rapid exchange of information on violations, and co-ordination of campaigns mobilising the international trade union family in the case of major violations.
The 103rd meeting of the ICFTU Executive Board (Brussels, December 1992) decided to establish a special Committee on Human and Trade Union Rights, which would meet at least once a year. It would bring together the different committees which previously worked on human and trade union rights issues in the different regions. During the period under review, the Committee met in Brussels four times: in May 1993, November 1993, June 1994, and December 1994. The Executive Board approved the following terms of reference for the Committee:
It also approved election of the following members:
Ex-officio members:
Associate Members:
*Consultations to take place with the organisations in the countries concerned.
**Elected by the Executive Board as Chairperson/Rapporteur.
Major agenda items discussed at various meetings of the Committee included:
Major resolutions and decisions produced by the committee for adoption by the Executive Board included:
The Human and Trade Union Rights Committee provided active support for the ICFTU's work on rights concerns and received frequent communications requesting action or providing information on serious violations. Circulars to committee members and other interested organisations totalled 19 in 1993 and rose to 44 by 1994. Prior to the creation of the Department of Trade Union Rights, such correspondence with affiliated organisations averaged 7 per year (1991 - 1992).
Yearly editions of the Survey continued to be published by the ICFTU and, starting in 1993, a concerted effort was made to upgrade both the quantity of material presented and the quality of the format. Individual countries cited for violating trade union rights rose from 53 in 1992 and 87 in 1993, to 91 in the 1994 Survey.
Each edition contained descriptions of violations in various countries by region. Data on social and economic conditions and ratification of rights instruments were also included. An appendix listed ICFTU, affiliate and ITS complaints submitted to the ILO's Committee on Freedom of Association. The Survey was the most widely distributed ICFTU publication. A total of 10,000 copies were printed annually in the four ICFTU official languages. Affiliates translated the contents into Danish, Dutch and Japanese.
Beginning in 1993, the Department of Trade Union Rights began administering a special International Solidarity Fund item, "Legal and Humanitarian Relief", which assisted labour organisations in defending their collective rights and provided support for individual unionists and their families. Major activities generated through the Fund for this two-year period included:
In developing an effective, rapid approach to identifying and taking action on trade union rights violations worldwide, it was seen to be essential that trained and motivated rights correspondents were nominated in each affiliated national centre. These specialists were to provide relevant information on violations to their own organisations and the ICFTU on a systematic basis and advise on developing trade union rights strategies within affiliates.
A series of regional conferences, sub-regional workshops and national seminars was initiated to implement this programme. An Asian conference in Phuket, Thailand (October 1993) and another in Africa in Cotonou, Benin (September 1994) allowed senior leaders to draft regional strategies. A ten-day workshop for sub-regional correspondents took place in Bangkok (August 1994) and additional sessions planned. Follow up national seminars were scheduled for participating trade unions to reinforce the rights network inside each country. Training manuals and resource materials were made available to assist this effort and plans were laid for a quarterly newsletter on trade union rights.
In December 1994, a workshop on trade union rights campaigning strategies was held in Brussels. Participants examined problems of selecting and coordinating major international labour movement rights campaigns and shared experiences in mobilising local support within national centres. Periodic strategy evaluation was seen to be essential in building a comprehensive support network to reinforce international solidarity efforts and to enhance the effectiveness of coordinated trade union action worldwide.
With funding from LO-Norway, a major two-year project, Strengthening Trade Union Rights in the Arab World, was initiated in December 1992. It focused on developing coordinated communications, information and educational work among a number of Arab-speaking trade unions in North Africa and the Middle East. During the reporting period, sub-regional conferences on trade union rights concerns for senior officers were organised in Cairo (July 1993) and Amman (January 1994).
A regional workshop for training trade union rights correspondents was held in Tunis in May 1994. Three one-week local seminars for reinforcing national centers' rights networks and reporting skills were held during 1994, in Tunis, Cairo and Amman. Additional sessions were planned for Beirut, Sana's and Casablanca. Arabic language materials were prepared for project use and a major report on human and trade union rights in the region was begun.
The ICFTU continued to use all available opportunities to defend and promote human and trade union rights within the ILO structure. It presented complaints against governments that violated trade union rights to the Committee on Freedom of Association, and updated them with supplementary submissions in the light of further developments.
In the period under review, the ICFTU presented, updated or associated itself with a total of 110 such complaints against the Governments of the following 37 countries: Argentina, Brazil, Burma (Myanmar), Cameroon, Canada, Central African Republic, Chad, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Czechoslovakia, Cuba, Djibouti, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Fiji, Gabon, Guatemala, Honduras, Indonesia, Kenya, Korea, Malawi, Morocco, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Poland, Sudan, Sweden, Thailand, Turkey, Venezuela and the former Yugoslavia.
With the creation of a Department of Trade Union Rights late in 1992, the ICFTU was able to focus greater attention on using the mechanisms of the ILO Committee on Freedom of Association to condemn violations under Conventions 87 and 98. The number of new complaints and submissions of supplementary information rose sharply from 14 in 1991 and 17 in 1992 to 31 in 1993 and 47 by 1994.
The ICFTU took the leading role in coordinating several special procedures under Articles 24 and 26 of the ILO Constitution. Hence, the Report of the Special Committee set up by the Governing Body under Article 26 to deal with the complaint lodged in June 1989 against Romania for non-observance of Convention 111 (Discrimination in Employment) was adopted at the 250th Session of the Governing Body (May/June 1991).
Representations were made by the ICFTU, under Article 24, against the former Federal Socialist Republic of Yugoslavia, in June 1991, for violations of Convention N- 111 against ethnic Albanian workers in the Autonomous Province of Kosovo. Although a Special Committee was established and its Report properly established and submitted, in May/June 1992 the Governing Body considered that it could not release the report, in view of the absence of a recognised successor government to former Yugoslavia.
An Article 24 representation was made against Burma/Myanmar, in February 1992, for violations of ILO Convention 29 on Forced Labour. The Special Committee established to deal with the representation produced a report which was highly critical of Burma's SLORC regime. This was approved by the Governing Body at its 261st session (November 1994). During this same period, the ICFTU was also associated with Article 24 Representations submitted by affiliates against their own governments in the (then) Czech and Slovak Republic (in November 1991, by CS-KOS, for violations of Convention N- 111) and in Sweden (in January 1992, by LO-TCO, for violations of Convention N- 121 on Employment Injury Benefits).
The ICFTU was represented at the 47th, 48th, 49th and 50th annual sessions of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, which met in Geneva during the period under review, as well as at each of the annual sessions of its Sub- Commission on the Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities.
ICFTU representatives intervened in debates of particular concern to trade unions, referring to human and trade union rights violations in Belarus, Burma/Myanmar, the Central African Republic, Chad, China, Colombia, Cuba, El Salvador, Fiji, Guatemala, Haiti, Indonesia, the Israeli-Occupied Arab Territories, Malawi, Thailand, the Sudan, South Africa, former Yugoslavia, Zambia, and the United Kingdom. They also spoke on many thematic procedures developed by the Commission, in particular the rights of the child and of migrant workers.
As a result of pressure from the ICFTU, the 48th and 50th Sessions of the Commission (1992 and 1994 respectively) adopted Resolutions on the Question of Trade Union Rights, which built on the first resolution adopted on this subject in 1990 and once more urged all governments to ratify and abide by key ILO Conventions on freedom of association.
Despite an improving climate of international cooperation, political considerations prevented the Commission from acting effectively on a number of situations involving gross violations of basic rights. Persistent ICFTU efforts to have Special Rapporteurs appointed to examine the rights situation in China and Colombia were kept up but had not yielded the desired effect by the end of the period under review.
The UN World Conference was attended by 167 governments and over 1,500 non- governmental organisations. It ended with the adoption of the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action. This comprehensive, 32-page document recalled all the major principles of human rights and defined objectives aimed at promoting and ensuring universal respect of these rights. It highlighted the need for structural reform of the UN's human rights machinery, including adoption of new instruments and mechanisms.
The document stressed that the human rights of women were a fundamental part of human rights, and spelt out related proposals: the right to petition under the relevant convention, CEDAW, the draft declaration on violence against women and the need for a Special Rapporteur on this issue. It underlined the importance of recognising the right to development as "an integral part of fundamental human rights" and discussed the related issues of poverty and the linkage between democracy and economic development. After intensive lobbying by the ICFTU's thirty- person delegation throughout the Conference, the final document included a paragraph on trade union rights. This read: "The World Conference supports all measures by the United Nations and its relevant specialised agencies to ensure the effective protection and promotion of trade union rights, as stipulated in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and other relevant international instruments. It calls on all States to fully abide with their obligations contained in this regard in international instruments".
During the period under review, the ICFTU intervened on serious violations of trade union rights in a large number of African countries. In addition to those presented below, there were complaints to the ILO Committee on Freedom of Association on the detention of trade union leaders in the Central African Republic (Case No. 1500, June 1991), and the arrest of union leaders in Djibouti (Case No. 1803, October 1994).
In February 1994, the ICFTU intervened in Togo following the arrest of a transport workers' union leader, Brother Komi Dackey. He was released at the end of December 1994 after an international ICFTU campaign developed jointly with the ITF. Several protests were sent to the Niger Government in 1993 - 94 concerning refusal to enter into dialogue over economic austerity measures, changes in labour law concerning the right to strike and the arrest of union leaders in May 1994 during a general strike. The ICFTU protested to the Côte d'Ivoire Government over the brutal repression of an agricultural workers' strike in May 1993, which led to the dismissal of 700 strikers. Protests were also made against repeated rights violations in Lesotho's construction and textile sectors in 1993 and 1994. During 1994 strikes, frustration of the industrial relations process and threats to trade union leaders in Swaziland were denounced by the ICFTU. There were similar protests to the Government of Zimbabwe in 1992 over the arrest of workers during a peaceful march, in 1993 for dismissals at the University of Zimbabwe and again, in 1994, for the threatened dismissal of 10,000 workers at the Post and Telegraph Corporation.
Several times early in 1991, the ICFTU wrote to President Paul Biya, protesting at government repression of the pro-democracy movement, the lack of respect for basic human rights, and the murder of non-violent marchers. It urged that political prisoners be released. Trade union freedom was further curtailed in 1992 by a new labour code, which imposed government authorisation for the creation of any new labour organisations.
Economic problems and the institution of a multiparty system heightened government sensitivity to opposition. In December 1993, CCTU General Secretary Louis Sombes attacked the President's economic policy at a press conference. This was broken up by the authorities and touched off an escalating government campaign of intimidation and efforts to take control of the trade union. The personal intervention of the ILO Director General was requested by the ICFTU in December 1993 to assure the life and safety of trade union leaders.
Systematic persecution of unionists became common and, in May 1994, the police briefly arrested Sombes, occupied CCTU headquarters and installed a new General Secretary from a pro-government minority faction. In June 1994, the ICFTU submitted a complaint to the ILO's Committee on Freedom of Association (Case No. 1772), and continued to submit additional information in September, October and November as new violations occurred.
An ICFTU/ICFTU-AFRO fact-finding mission (October 1994) met the opposing CCTU factions and the Labour Minister in an effort to promote a democratic union congress, which might allow the workers to resolve the crisis. Human and Trade Union Rights Committee members were kept aware as events took place and limited legal assistance was provided to CCTU. Continued protests and pressure, including representations to the World Bank, the IMF and the European Union, appeared to blunt the Cameronian authorities' drive to dominate the CCTU. A democratic trade union congress, free of government control, took place in January 1995 and delegates overwhelmingly re-elected Louis Sombes.
The overthrow of the bloody regime of Hissène Habré by Col. Idriss Début, in December 1990, seemed set to open a new era of national dialogue and reconciliation. It soon became apparent, however, that Chad would continue to suffer political and ethnic strife. Repression of basic human and trade union rights was denounced frequently by the ICFTU. It intervened repeatedly on behalf of its affiliate, the Union Nationale des Syndicats du Tchad (UNST, later to become UST), which proclaimed total independence from all political parties at its Second Extraordinary Congress, in April 1991. UNST members and leaders suffered harassment, detention and even killings during the period under review.
In May 1991, the ICFTU publicly warned the Government against dissolving the UNST, and threatened to take formal action at the ILO. The next month, it again wrote to President D‚by, saying that, should he persist in dissolving the UNST, the ICFTU would continue to maintain its relations with its affiliate. Throughout 1992, the ICFTU intervened frequently on behalf of repressed trade unionists. The year was marked by several industrial disputes, ending in a full-scale confrontation between the Government and the UNST. This began in May, when the ICFTU gave public support to the teachers' branch of its affiliate (which had changed its name to Union des Syndicats du Tchad, UST), whose members faced government hostility in the wake of a strike calling for payment of back-wages.
One week later, the ICFTU again intervened in support of a warning strike called by the UST to protest against government plans to cut wages by 30 per cent and to increase income tax. The issue eventually led to a prolonged general strike at the end of July, when the ICFTU again wrote to President D‚by urging him to reverse a decision to cut wages in the public sector by 10 to 20 per cent. One week later, the ICFTU issued a strong condemnation of the Chadian regime after several members of the UST's Women's Committee were injured by police during a peaceful march. The ICFTU associated itself with the UST's call on the Government to lift restrictions on strike action and peaceful demonstrations.
The ICFTU again intervened in mid-August, after the Government dismissed nine public servants for trade union activities. The ICFTU accused the Government of trying to destabilise the UST in retaliation for its call for a democratisation of the regime and the introduction of alternative economic recovery plans. The Government initially agreed to hold talks on these issues with the UST, but the promised negotiation failed to materialise. A five-day general strike was organised by the UST one month later, leading to yet another ICFTU protest when the authorities arrested two UST leaders, dismissed 17 members, including its General Secretary, and demoted 17 more for their role in the strike. The ICFTU then requested a meeting with Idriss Début, offering to send a top-level delegation to Ndjamena for talks with the Government. However, entry visas were denied and the mission was cancelled.
By mid-September, a complete picture of the repression against the strikers emerged. This led the ICFTU to lodge a formal complaint against Chad at the ILO, for violation of ILO Convention No. 87 (Case No. 1669 of the Committee on Freedom of Association). The ICFTU also wrote to the World Bank, the IMF and the European Community, stressing that "the repeated refusal by Chad's Government to negotiate with the country's trade unions (would) only amplify the present crisis". It called on them not to provide funds to the country in the absence of solid steps towards democracy. However, in October, the Government reaffirmed its prohibition of strikes and banned all trade union activities. Two days later, the army occupied the UST headquarters. Attempts were reported on the lives of at least two UST officials and another person was murdered. The ICFTU again sent protests to the Government, and renewed its pressure on multilateral financial institutions.
In November 1992, in view of Chad's refusal to let a delegation enter the country, the ICFTU enlisted the help of its French affiliates to put pressure on the Ndjamena regime via the Government of France. The ICFTU General Secretary led a delegation which met top Foreign Development Cooperation Ministry officials in Paris. The ICFTU argued strongly for France to convince the Chadian Government to speed up the convocation of a national conference on democracy. The Conference had been strongly requested by the UST.
In November, after the UST General Secretary had been detained for several days and his Deputy prevented from travelling to an African trade union meeting, the ICFTU-AFRO Executive Board adopted a strongly worded Resolution demanding an end to anti-union repression. Dismissals of UST activists continued unabated for some time, with up to 1,000 activists losing their jobs and 1,000 more facing disciplinary proceedings.
On 16 November, the Government agreed to lift most restrictions on the union and the UST conditionally suspended its general strike. Nevertheless, the ICFTU continued its campaign with its French and Belgian affiliates. In mid-November, the UST General Secretary visited Brussels to inform the ICFTU about measures affecting over 2,600 UST members and activists. He gave the Government until the end of the month to lift the measures, threatening to resume the strike if the authorities failed to act. Optimism was short-lived: two weeks later, the ICFTU joined the UST, the Journalist's Union of Chad and the Chadian League for Human Rights in demanding an investigation into the killing of Djerabe Declaud, a leading television journalist who was shot by unidentified gunmen.
Killings of unionists led to several more ICFTU interventions in 1993, although the year had started on a positive note, when the Government announced its intention to hold the national conference, a key UST demand, and to pay salary arrears of civil servants. In March, the ICFTU urged the authorities to open a full investigation into the kidnapping and murder of Samuel Mbaïguedem, a member of the National Executive of the UST. In June, the ICFTU strongly condemned the assassination of two more UST leaders, Laoukoura Tatorum and M'Bailo Miambe. The ICFTU gave full backing to a three-day strike organised by the UST to support a demand that the Government ensure the safety of all citizens. The demand was repeated in a November protest letter, in which the ICFTU called forcefully for an official investigation into the killing - in separate incidents in October and November - of two leaders of the UST affiliated veterinary trade union.
In May 1994, the ICFTU protested against the police occupation of the UST's premises at the Bourse du Travail (Labour Exchange). The UST had been involved in a strike calling on the Government to honour its 1993 commitments to pay civil servants' back wages. The dispute escalated in June, when the ICFTU reacted strongly to a series of grave threats by the Government against its affiliate. During a meeting with the UST, Prime Minister Kassire Coumakaye threatened that "blood will be shed, we will orchestrate a students' strike and they will attack you day and night, you will be arrested and international organisations will have no means to intervene". A few days after the meeting, a "student group" emerged and published pamphlets calling for the elimination of UST leaders, who had meanwhile been strongly criticised in public meetings held by President Idriss Déby.
In July, however, the Government signed a Social Pact with the UST, in which it agreed to pay salaries and grants regularly and to gradually reduce salary arrears. Proposals to lower wages in the state sector were dropped, and the Government committed itself to review labour legislation and respect binding ILO Conventions.
After years of repression and domination of trade unions under the brutal Mengistu Haile Mariam regime, a democratic Ethiopian labour movement, the Confederation of Ethiopian Trade Unions (CETU), re-emerged in November 1993. However, the new Government of Meles Zenawi failed to promote respect for trade union rights and itself engineered a leadership split within CETU ranks in order to exercise control.
CETU planned to hold a General Council to resolve internal disputes in October 1994 but this was frustrated by police intervention. The following month, the ICFTU protested against this overt government interference to the authorities and asked Human and Trade Union Rights Committee members to lend support. An ICFTU- AFRO mission travelled to Addis Ababa to investigate. At the end of the period under review, trade union premises continued to be occupied and senior leaders were still under surveillance. Several, fearing for their safety, had fled the country. Further information on the worsening situation was provided to the Human and Trade Union Rights Committee late in 1994.
The four-day arrest and detention in May 1993 of Joseph Mugalla, the General Secretary of the national centre COTU, on charges of inciting workers to strike, marked the beginning of serious acts of government interference into COTU's internal affairs. Since the establishment of political pluralism in Kenya in 1992, COTU increasingly exerted its autonomy and independence. COTU called a nationwide strike in May to demand the release of its leaders and to back its recent wage claim. Its headquarters were surrounded by riot police and a shop stewards' meeting was evicted from the premises.
In July, a government-backed minority group within COTU appointed officials to replace COTU's constitutional leadership at a meeting held with government support. Kenya's Registrar of Trade Unions immediately conferred legal recognition on them. The independence of Kenya's judiciary was severely compromised in August when court action by COTU's legitimate leadership led to a ruling in favour of the minority group, which ignored provisions in the Trade Union Act.
The ICFTU submitted a complaint to the ILO and co-ordinated an international trade union campaign for the reinstatement of the legitimate leadership, recommending to affiliates and ITS that the minority group be isolated, and pressure put on the Kenyan Government to fully respect the autonomy and independence of COTU. Contributions were made to COTU's legal expenses by the ICFTU and several affiliates, and some assistance was provided to enable the legitimate leadership to run a small secretariat in Nairobi pending the raising of funds from COTU affiliates. The ICFTU also regularly briefed the international financial institutions and the European Community, requesting them to convey their concerns to the Kenyan authorities. ICFTU affiliates asked their governments to exert pressure on the Kenyan Government.
The issue remained prominent in the Kenyan press, which focused on the government's non-respect of trade union independence and Kenya's growing international isolation. The Danish government reduced aid to Kenya in August 1993, citing government interference in trade union affairs as one of its seven reasons for doing so. A High Court Ruling in November nullified the registration of the minority group and reinstated COTU's legitimate officials, although the minority group refused to leave COTU headquarters. Finally, in January 1994, the Court of Appeal ordered the Registrar of Trade Unions to register Mugalla as COTU General Secretary. This took place on 1 February. In March 1994, the ILO Committee on Freedom of Association found that the Kenyan government had violated the principles of freedom of association.
In 1992, Malawi continued to hold out against pluralistic trends which were making progress elsewhere in Africa. Early in the year, President Banda warned that dissidents returning to Malawi to campaign for democracy would become "meat for crocodiles". Chakufwa Chihana, the Secretary-General of the South African Trade Union Co-ordinating Council (SATUCC) was arrested and interrogated by Malawi's security forces for six hours in March. In April he was arrested and imprisoned after attending trade union-related activities in Zambia. Five SATUCC employees were arrested and detained, while three others escaped to Zambia.
The Malawian authorities closed SATUCC's headquarters in Lilongwe later in April, announcing that SATUCC could no longer run its activities from Malawi. The headquarters were temporarily moved to Kitwe, Zambia. Spontaneous workers' demonstrations, which broke out in May to demand pay increases, were repressed by the police. Several workers were killed.
The ICFTU immediately submitted a complaint to the ILO and launched an international trade union campaign for the release of Chihana. This included representations to the European Community and the international financial institutions. The ICFTU sent a high-level delegation to meet the Malawian authorities. The delegation was able to visit Chihana in jail and it secured the release of the last of the detained SATUCC staff members. Pressure from the ICFTU and its affiliates resulted in a six-month delay in decisions on bilateral non-humanitarian aid to Malawi, at a World Bank-sponsored meeting in May.
The high costs of Chihana's legal defence were covered by the ICFTU and a number of ICFTU affiliates. The ICFTU also assisted Mrs Chihana, who was sacked from her government job, with a contribution towards her rent. At the beginning of 1993, the ILO Freedom of Association Committee called for Chihana's release and the reopening of SATUCC's office. Chihana's detention and trial were marked throughout by extensive legal irregularities. He was held incommunicado for several months, and in July 1992 was charged with four counts of sedition and released on bail, for which the ICFTU stood surety. He was rearrested a few days later and released on bail again in September. In December he was found guilty on two counts and sentenced to two years imprisonment with hard labour.
In March 1993 Chihana's appeal against the sentence and application for bail led to the gathering of 3,000 pro-democracy activists outside the Supreme Court. Bail was denied but on 29 March his sentence was reduced to nine months. He was released on 12 June. Two days later, a referendum on multipartyism, widely believed to have taken place because of pressure from Malawi's main donors threatening to suspend aid, resulted in a majority vote for multiparty elections.
The trade union rights' climate in Morocco over the period under review was characterised by an increasing intensity of violations of fundamental ILO conventions. The UMT claimed that hundreds of its members were jailed for trade union activities during the reporting period. Torture, injuries and dismissals of workers were common. The worst year of this period was 1993 when 96 UMT militants were arrested and jailed. Most of the charges used against trade unionists were based on the infamous paragraph 288 of the Moroccan penal code, which determined that workers on picket lines were in violation of freedom to work regulations.
In September 1991 the ICFTU sent a message of support to the UMT for its efforts to apply terms of a collective agreement. The ICFTU protested at the arrest of striking workers to the Moroccan Government in January and July 1992, and informed all affiliates of gross rights violations. The same year the ILO registered three complaints against the Government of Morocco. Charges included the illegal dismissal of union members, the non-protection against anti-union discrimination, violence against trade unionists and blatant interference in the internal affairs of trade unions. Documentation illustrated a persistent trend for the employers and government to exploit the lack of protection for workers in Morocco's legal system. There was also a report that two disappeared UMT leaders, Abdelhaq Rouissi and Houcine El Manouzi, imprisoned respectively in 1964 and 1972, were still alive and detained in secret camps.
The UMT filed a total of 15 complaints with the ILO charging the Government with infringing trade union rights. The ICFTU filed case 1643 with the ILO in April 1992, charging the Government with dismissals and violence to break strikes. The UMT also filed cases 1687 and 1691 on anti-union discrimination in December 1992. In April 1993 the ICFTU associated itself with UMT case 1712, which documented similar offences against workers. There were three other UMT cases the same year. One of the UMT's priorities was to force the Government of Morocco to ratify ILO Conventions Nos. 87 and 135.
Throughout the period, a systematic anti-union climate was maintained in Morocco which illustrated collusion between government and employers to repress free trade unionism. This situation was characterised by arrests, beating of striking workers (including pregnant women), torture and harassment by police, security forces and employers. The sectors most vulnerable included agriculture, textiles, food production and dockworkers. In spite of frequent international solidarity protests there was little evidence, at the end of the period under review, that immediate improvement was likely.
Nigeria's labour movement was in the forefront of popular protests triggered by the decision by General Sani Abacha's military regime to annul the June 1993 popular election which, apparently, was won by Chief M.L.O. Abiola. Fearful of a rising tide of discontent, the military arrested Abiola and put him on trial. In July 1994, the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) called a strike in support of workers rights, democracy and Chief Abiola's release. By mid-month the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASAN) decided to support the action and, in August, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) asked its members to join. The Human and Trade Union Rights Committee was alerted on 3 August 1994.
The Abacha Government struck back at the labour movement, deposing the leadership of the three unions and replacing them with government-appointed administrators. Police sealed off their headquarters. The same day the ICFTU requested the personal intervention of the ILO Director General "to restore the union's democratically elected leadership" and filed a case (No. 1793) with the Committee of Freedom of Association, charging the Government with illegal dismissal of union leaders and police occupation of premises.
The Committee's November 1994 recommendation upheld the ICFTU charges, stating that the measures adopted by the authorities violated international standards, adding that oil was not an essential sector and that the strike could not be banned. It declared that all decrees banning legitimate trade union leaders from doing their jobs should be repealed and measures should be adopted allowing the NLC national centre and the two oil workers' unions to carry out normal union activities.
The ICFTU sent a mission to Nigeria in October 1994 to meet the authorities, who gave firm promises to facilitate the organisation of free trade union congresses, which would restore democracy to the labour movement. The release of jailed trade unionists was also requested. In spite of these specific commitments, the Government did nothing to relax its repression of the labour movement.
The period under review culminated, in April 1994, in South Africa's first democratic elections. Until that point, the struggle against apartheid continued to be a top priority for the ICFTU. Through the twice-yearly meetings of the ICFTU Co-ordinating Committee on South Africa, material, moral and political support was extended to South Africa's democratic trade unions, COSATU and NACTU. The ICFTU Co-ordinated Programme continued to give project support to the democratic unions and related institutions, as well as legal and relief assistance. South Africa's democratic trade unions, and COSATU in particular, continued to play an important role in the developments taking place in the country.
During 1991, progress towards the elimination of apartheid was slow and uncertain although some important legislative reforms took place. These included the repeal of the three "cornerstones of apartheid"; the Population Registration Act; the Group Areas Act; and the Land Act, and the amendment of the Internal Security Act. The ICFTU welcomed the announcement of the repeal, in February, of amendments to the 1988 Labour Relations Amendment Act as a victory for the democratic trade unions. This reversed the anti-union legislation brought in in 1988, and translated into law the terms of the agreement reached between COSATU, NACTU and the employers organisation, SACCOLA. However, the new legislation continued to omit farmworkers, domestic workers, the public sector, and workers in the so-called bantustans, from its scope.
The political actors in South Africa focused on building coalitions in the run-up to the opening of formal negotiations on the country's future at the Conference for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA), which opened in December 1991. Political violence dominated much of the news, and in July the involvement of government agencies was revealed. The ICFTU continued to call for the maintenance of sanctions against South Africa on the basis of an Executive Board resolution adopted at the end of 1990, which argued that the relaxation of sanctions at this crucial period would impede progress towards peaceful change in South Africa. The ICFTU protested against the premature lifting of sanctions by the European Community and Japan, and campaigned against emigration to South Africa.
In June, the ICFTU protested to the President of South Africa about the prosecution of four COSATU leaders on spurious kidnapping charges, and in response to a request from COSATU, placed a full page advertisement in the "Weekly Mail" about the trial of Jay Naidoo, Sydney Mufamadi, Moses Mayekiso and Baba Schalk. In November, the ICFTU sent a message of support for a general strike held in protest against the introduction of VAT, which shifted the burden of taxation to the poor.
The ICFTU submitted its comments to the Chairman of the ILO Fact-Finding and Conciliation Commission on Freedom of Association, which visited South Africa at the beginning of 1992, to investigate COSATU's 1988 ILO complaint. In 1992, South Africa's progress towards democracy remained fraught with obstacles. Political violence claimed the lives of over 80 trade unionists during the year and many thousands of working people were killed in the townships. Revelations about the involvement of state agencies and their co-operation with the Inkatha Freedom Party in fomenting much of the violence continued.
In April, the ICFTU held a special meeting of its Co-ordinating Committee on South Africa to draw up a statement of support for South Africa's trade unions in the transitional period and to look at the possibility of having a code of conduct for investment in a post-apartheid South Africa. In June, political negotiations on the Country's future were suspended by the ANC after the massacre of 43 people in the township of Boipatong. A week of mass action in August was subsequently launched by the ANC and its allies, including COSATU. Over four million workers stayed away from work on the two days of the first phase of the action. The ICFTU sent a representative to observe the events.
A formal summit between Nelson Mandela and President De Klerk in September laid the basis for the resumption of formal negotiations and agreed on several elements of a future constitution and on the establishment of an interim government. Political violence continued to claim the lives of many people. The ICFTU Co-ordinating Committee on South Africa discussed the issue of violence and resolved to send a mission to South Africa.
In January 1993, an ICFTU Fact-Finding Mission on Violence and Solidarity with the Democratic trade union movement went to South Africa to investigate the violence and its consequences for free political and trade union organisation and activities. Members of the mission travelled to Natal, Johannesburg and Cape Town with COSATU and NACTU to examine the situation on the spot. The mission also had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. The ICFTU held the 42nd meeting of the Co-ordinating Committee on South Africa in Johannesburg immediately after the mission. One of the results of the mission was the establishment of an ICFTU Observer Group on Violence composed of representatives of ICFTU affiliates stationed in South Africa and the ICFTU's Southern African representative.
In March 1993, multi-party constitutional negotiations resumed. In the second half of 1993, a breakthrough came when the multiparty constitutional negotiations set 27 April 1994 as the election date. In September, South Africa established a Transitional Executive Council. Political parties began to prepare for elections. Violence continued amid threats from the extreme right wing. In May, South Africa was discussed at the first meeting of the newly-established ICFTU Human and Trade Union Rights Committee, which had incorporated the ICFTU Co-ordinating Committee on South Africa.
The ICFTU wrote to the UN and other international organisations impressing upon them the need to send massive numbers of observers to the April 1994 elections. The ICFTU, its affiliates and ITS representing the international trade union movement composed a team of over 200 observers and covered most of the employment centres in both rural and urban areas. The elections were declared free and fair by the international community.
During the period under review, hundreds of trade unionists were believed to be in detention in Sudan in extremely poor conditions. Several were known to have been tortured. At least one trade unionist died under torture, another was kidnapped and disappeared and another was beaten to death.
The ICFTU made two complaints to the ILO against the military Government of Sudan as well as numerous representations to the UN Centre on Human Rights and other UN bodies. Immediately after Sudan's 1989 military coup, the regime had implemented decrees dissolving all trade union organisations and had confiscated their assets. Many trade unionists were dismissed, detained without trial or sentenced to long term imprisonment. A State of Emergency was imposed and remained in force at the end of the reporting period. The Government appointed preparatory and steering committees to manage trade union affairs and claimed that this meant the reactivation of trade unions operating before the coup. The committees operated under close government control.
In 1992 a new Trade Union Act was introduced by the regime. This severely restricted trade union rights, for example, by imposing a single trade union system. In August of the same year, the regime ran trade union elections. Detentions and intimidation ensured that supporters of the regime's fundamentalist policy obtained leadership positions. During 1992, the Secretariat of the Sudan Workers Trade Union Federation in Exile was established in Cairo, Egypt. The ICFTU maintained friendly relations with the Secretariat and made a small financial contribution to its activities during 1994.
At the beginning of 1993, the regime organised a congress of all trade unions which affiliated them to a pro-Government umbrella organisation - the new Sudan Workers Trade Union Federation. The objective of the Federation as defined by the Government was "to mobilise the masses for production and to defend the authenticity of the Islamic state". The ICFTU denounced this congress to the Sudanese authorities. In May 1993, the ICFTU Human and Trade Union Rights Committee adopted a policy of no contact with the Government-controlled SWTUF, which was subsequently endorsed by the 104th Executive Board meeting. The ICFTU called into question the credentials of Sudan's Workers' Delegates at the ILO's 1992 and 1993 International Labour Conferences, in Geneva.
During the period under review, the ICFTU intervened on serious violations of trade union rights occurring throughout the Asia and Pacific region. It lodged protests with governments or employers and presented formal complaints at the ILO, sent fact-finding missions, organised international solidarity conferences and delivered legal and humanitarian assistance to trade unions in several countries.
In Papua New Guinea, the ICFTU joined the Miners' International Federation in June 1991, in demanding the reinstatement of dismissed trade unionists and condemning repression against striking miners at the Pogera coal mine, where 200 strikers had been attacked, leaving four of them shot and wounded. In September 1992, the ICFTU supported striking workers at Air Niugini and protested at the dismissal and eviction from their homes of 130 airline employees.
In Bangladesh, the ICFTU criticised violent suppression of strikes and threats against trade union leaders. In January 1993, it demanded the release of textile union leader Golam Kabir Babul, sentenced the previous month to 4 months' imprisonment for strike action in demand of minimum wages, one weekly day of rest and the payment of overtime compensation. It also called for the lifting of charges against M.A. Gafur, a senior trade union leader accused under an anti-terrorism law usually applied by the Government to silence opposition against the party in power.
In Malaysia, the ICFTU intervened repeatedly with the Government concerning its refusal to grant the right to organise and bargain collectively in the electronics industry. It also denounced harassment of trade union leaders, including a wave of vicious attacks by the national press during July 1992. In Sri Lanka, the ICFTU denounced attacks on the right to strike. It supported a Peace Plan drafted by its affiliate, the Ceylon Workers' Congress, CWC, in June 1993, aimed at bringing the country's bloody civil war to an end. In January 1993, in Hong Kong, the ICFTU coordinated an international campaign to support a major strike of flight attendants at Cathay Pacific. Members of the Flight Attendants' Union were submitted to intimidation and threats of dismissal.
In Vanuatu, in March 1994, the ICFTU sent assistance to miners who maintained a strike for 12 weeks. It condemned repression of strikes including mass-dismissals - particularly in the teaching profession, interference in union affairs, the denial of the union's right to affiliate internationally, and the detention of trade unionists. Detainees included the Presidents of the ICFTU-affiliated Vanuatu Council of Trade Unions, (VCTU) and of the VTU teachers' union, Obed Masingiow; the VCTU General Secretary Ephraim Kalsaku and the President of the VPSA public services union, Barton Bisiwei.
Strong protests were lodged when the Government repeatedly denied entry visas to foreign trade unionists. In the Philippines, the ICFTU wrote to President Fidel Ramos in June 1993 to express concern at reports of violence against striking workers in the airline industry and other abuses of human and trade union rights. The ICFTU also denounced repression against striking teachers in Nepal in June 1992. Under a ban imposed that year by the Government, teachers were prevented from engaging in any sort of political activity.
Burma suffered from severe human and trade union rights violations at the hands of the SLORC military dictatorship. Conditions became worse after the SLORC refused to accept the results of the May 1990 democratic elections. The Federation of Trade Unions, Burma (FTUB), formed in January 1991, was forced to operate only in the border areas and in exile as all union activities in the country were repressed. During 1992 - 1994, several FTUB union organisers and activists were arrested and jailed inside Burma. The ICFTU's 103rd Executive Board (Brussels, December 1992) extended "solidarity to the relentless struggle waged by Burmese workers as represented by the FTUB and other prodemocracy activists".
The ICFTU provided observations to the ILO in January 1991 on rights violations based on the extensive use of forced labour in Burma. In January 1993, it submitted a formal representation under Article 24 of the ILO's constitution, charging the Burmese Government with the use of military porterage and other forced labour, a violation of Convention No. 29 on forced or obligatory labour. In November 1994, a special committee of the ILO Governing Body established to investigate this ICFTU complaint found the Burmese Government to be severely in breach of Convention No. 29.
FTUB Secretary U. Maung Maung briefed the ICFTU's June 1994 Human and Trade Union Rights Committee on the situation in Burma. Limited equipment and supplies were provided to FTUB by ICFTU-APRO as solidarity assistance during 1993 and two seminars on rights and organisational skills were organised in September 1994 (ICFTU and AFL-CIO/AAFLI) and December 1994 (ICFTU-APRO). The ICFTU continued to monitor the situation closely and prepared a special report, "Burma: Human Rights, Foreign Trade, Aid and Investments" in January 1994 to assist the international labour movement in promoting economic pressure on the SLORC regime.
Throughout the period under review, the ICFTU continued to monitor grave violations of basic human and trade union rights. Hundreds of activists of independent workers' organisations remained in detention following the 1989 "Beijing Spring" democratic movement. Leaders and organisers of new independent trade unions, formed in the early 1990's, were detained as soon as they were discovered by the infamous Public Security Bureau (PSB). Scores were sentenced to heavy prison terms, ranging from 3 to 20 years.
Continued repression of independent trade unionists and several provisions of a new labour code formed the basis for a new ICFTU complaint against China at the ILO on June 2, 1992, the eve of the third Tiananmen Square anniversary. The new law restricted even further Chinese workers' right to join or form trade unions independently of the state- controlled ACFTU structures. In a briefing on the situation in China released the same day, the ICFTU reported the existence of a new underground group, the Free Labour Union of China. Meanwhile, on 3 June, security officials detained four independent trade union activists about to commemorate the Beijing Spring of 1989.
Those detained included the 1989 leader, Han Dongfang, founder of the Beijing WAF. He had just been released after being held for over two years without charges in a Beijing jail where he contracted severe tuberculosis. Han Dongfang was released two days later, after suffering injuries during a beating on police premises. The ICFTU angrily condemned the Beijing Government's statement that "by hitting his head hard against a desk, Han deliberately injured himself in order to attract international attention". The ICFTU also asked the Chinese authorities for permission to send an official delegation to the country to meet independent trade unionists. The authorities never replied.
In August, however, Han Dongfang was allowed to leave China for one year, to seek medical treatment abroad. In August 1993, the ICFTU and ICFTU-APRO protested to the Chinese authorities against the violent expulsion from China of Han Dongfang, after his attempted return from the USA, where he had received medical treatment for the illness developed while in detention. Han was detained and beaten and thrown out the next day by PSB officials. One month earlier, he had publicly exposed the situation of trade union rights in his country while in Vienna as a member of the ICFTU delegation to the UN's World Conference on Human Rights. The ICFTU denounced the expulsion in a complaint to the ILO and called its affiliates to urge their governments to continue pressure on China's authorities in support of Han. It renewed its condemnation on 7 September, after a PSB spokesman in Beijing stated that Han would be allowed to return if he admitted having harmed China's interests while abroad and pledged to cease all his independent trade union activities.
In October, the ICFTU wrote to the authorities demanding the release of Wang Miaogen, the 1989 leader of the Shanghai WAF, from a psychiatric institution where he had been confined by the PSB. In November, it protested again when Han Dongfang was prevented, on orders from Beijing, from boarding a plane from Hong Kong to the Chinese capital. The situation in China was examined in December that year by the ICFTU's Human and Trade Union Rights Committee and Executive Board, which called for a consumer boycott of toys produced in China. At the end of the month, the ICFTU once more protested against the regime's plans to try a group of at least seven free trade union activists on charges of "counter-revolutionary activities".
Further repression was denounced in March 1994, when the ICFTU lodged a complaint at the ILO, after Chinese authorities detained four trade union activists: Zhou Guoqiang, a labour lawyer who had acted as Han Dongfang's counsel, Qian Yumin, Yuan Hongbin and Bao Ge. Two of these had already spent time in prison for their involvement in the 1989 WAF. The ICFTU strongly reacted later the same month when Zhou was accused of "colluding with hostile overseas forces and disturbing social order". The ICFTU said in a statement that the charges referred to Zhou's contacts with Han which, the ICFTU said, were part of their legitimate trade union activities. Still in March, the ICFTU protested against the arrest of labour activist Liu Nachun, who had proposed establishing a new organisation to campaign for the right to strike.
In May, the ICFTU accused the Government of launching a deliberate campaign to silence any independent trade union activity in the country's Special Economic Zones (SEZ's) and called its so-called liberalisation policies a "cosmetic move aimed at deceiving international public opinion". The statement came in reaction to the arrest of three free trade union activists in the Szenzen SEZ, just across the border from Hong Kong.
At the end of May, the ICFTU wrote to US President Bill Clinton, expressing disappointment at his decision to renew China's Most-Favoured- Nation status and de-link human rights issues from economic relations. The ICFTU said the renewal of MFN status gave China "an unfair trading advantage based on work practices which were in contravention of universal labour standards". The letter also called on the US to support efforts aimed at forcing a commitment from China to respect basic workers' rights before it was admitted into the World Trade Organisation, the successor to GATT.
In July, the ICFTU joined the textile workers' international, ITGLWF, in urging the Government to launch a public enquiry into a series of industrial accidents which killed 93 people in the textile, shoe and toy industries. Just before the accidents occurred, a Chinese official speaking at the ILO's International Labour Conference in Geneva had rejected warnings about industrial safety by ITGLWF General Secretary Neil Kearney, calling them "an attack against a sovereign state". At the end of July, the ICFTU condemned the arrests of a long-time democracy activist, Liu Nanchun and of Liu Huanwen, a Beijing independent labour organiser. Earlier, they had applied for permission to establish a "National Alliance to Protect Labourers' Rights". Detentions had started as soon as plans to register the group became known.
In September, the ICFTU produced a damning report on trade union and other human rights in China and obtained the assistance of its French affiliates, the CFDT and Force Ouvrière, in conveying it, via the Government of France, to China's President Jiang Zemin during an official visit to Paris. Detailing the issues of detained labour activists, the increase in industrial disputes and the rise in occupational accidents due to systematic infringements of safety standards, the report also mentioned the start of trial proceedings against a group of free trade unionists. The trial, which became known as the "Beijing Fifteen", eventually opened in December and ended in a series of harsh convictions, ranging from 3 to 20 years in jail.
In December, the ICFTU Executive Board heard a detailed statement on the situation of trade union and other human rights in China from Han Dongfang, invited especially for this purpose. A lengthy discussion took place, based on a detailed survey of ICFTU affiliates and ITS carried out by the secretariat throughout 1994. The Board then upheld its policy of discouraging contacts with China's official trade union organisation, the so-called ACFTU, as long as the latter refused to commit itself publicly and unequivocally to full respect for fundamental human and trade union rights.
The unelected interim Government, which took power after the 1987 military coups, remained in power until the May 1992 elections. The discriminatory constitution, which was imposed by decree in 1990, ensured the political domination of ethnic Fijians over other communities by guaranteeing them automatic majorities in parliament. In line with this, the Government fostered racially- based unions to undermine the Fiji Trade Union Congress (FTUC). Discriminatory public service employment practices were carried out under a public service decree. In May 1991, in response to strikes in the mining and sugar industries, the Government in effect outlawed strikes in these sectors, making trade unionists and workers liable to penalties of up to 14 years imprisonment and heavy fines. The FTUC's general strike threat led to the Government's suspension of the decrees. However, in November, far-reaching anti-union amendments to Fiji's labour legislation were brought in. Decrees 42, 43 and 44, and Legal Notices 58 and 59 constituted a severe attack on trade union rights and on the FTUC, eroding its ability to operate effectively and permitting unacceptable government interference in internal trade union affairs. Furthermore, the decrees were in complete contravention of assurances given to ICFTU missions to Fiji in 1987 and 1988 that any review of labour legislation would take place through tripartite consultations.
The ICFTU submitted a complaint to the ILO at the beginning of 1992, with PSI support. In February of that year, legal proceedings were instituted against the FTUC General Secretary, Mahendra Chaudhry, on grounds of holding office in more than one trade union or industrial association, which was outlawed by the decrees. A court ruling was later obtained adjourning the case indefinitely.
The ICFTU made representations to the European Community institutions throughout 1991 and 1992 concerning possible trade and assistance sanctions under the Lomé‚ Convention, in particular the ending of the favourable access of Fijian sugar to the EC. Arrangements were also made for FTUC delegations to meet Community officials and MEPs. Affiliates were requested to undertake solidarity action with the FTUC. In 1993, the Government effected minor and selective changes to the labour law in response to pressure from the FTUC, the ICFTU, and the ILO, which had recommended major changes to the legislation.
The Government's budget, presented in November 1994, included provisions withdrawing the collective bargaining rights of 36,300 workers by means of the Counter- Inflation Act, which imposed wage restrictions in the public service, statutory bodies, and government-owned companies. The Government subsequently removed statutory bodies and government-owned companies from the jurisdiction of the act.
No consultation had been carried out with the FTUC, which gave notice of a national strike to protest against the act, and to call for the revival of the Tripartite Forum, which had operated before the 1987 military coups, and amendments to labour legislation as recommended by the ILO. In December, the Government lifted the wage order and announced the reactivation of the Tripartite Forum. The FTUC viewed the decisions as a turning point in industrial relations in the country, and negotiations on labour reforms were reported to have begun at the end of the year.
The dispute over union recognition between the Fiji Mineworkers Union (FMU) and the Australian-owned Emperor Gold Mining Company at Vatukoula, which began at the beginning of 1991, continued. At the end of 1994, the Government announced a Commission of Inquiry into industrial relations at the company.
Strong limitations on the right of workers to establish and join independent trade unions remained in force throughout the period under review. Under the country's legislation, only one nationwide organisation, the SPSI, was allowed to function. As was common in Indonesia, retired military officers held the key- positions within SPSI, which was strictly controlled by the Government. Since the mid-80's, regular attempts had been made to organise independent trade unions. Whenever they seemed poised to elicit a strong following among workers, they were mercilessly crushed by the authorities.
In June 1991, the ICFTU lodged a protest with President Suharto of Indonesia against the three day detention of Saut Aritonang, President of the independent union organisation Setia Kawan, and the detention and abuse in jail of several independent trade union activists. The arrests were made following a series of strikes in support of a demand for the enforcement of minimum wage and labour welfare laws. In August the same year, the ICFTU and its Asia and Pacific Regional Organisation (ICFTU-APRO) urged the country's Labour Minister to grant formal recognition to Setia Kawan and to speed up ratification of ILO Convention No. 87 on Freedom of Association.
The ICFTU and APRO protested over the closure of the SBSI congress by the police, forty minutes after it opened in a Jakarta hotel, in July 1993. The SBSI had applied for permission to hold the congress one month earlier, but received no reply. Delegates had their identities checked and their room-keys impounded. In August, the ICFTU and ICFTU-APRO wrote to President Suharto to protest at the murder of a female labour activist, Marsinah. Her mutilated body had been found three days after her abduction from a watch-factory where she had organised a workers' protest against low wages. The case was tried in 1994, but the ICFTU denounced the outcome as a fraud, especially when the firm's managers, initially sentenced to heavy prison terms, were released on appeal by the Supreme Court.
In April 1994, the ICFTU condemned the Government for arresting hundreds of workers who had taken part in a massive walk-out in the North Sumatran city of Medan while an ICFTU mission was in the country to investigate the trade union rights situation. The Government had falsely accused the SBSI of instigating violence and racial hatred during the demonstrations, which left a local ethnic Chinese businessman dead. In April also, the ICFTU criticised the Government for issuing a ban on the SBSI's activities, and lodged a formal complaint at the ILO on this subject.
In May, the ICFTU hosted Muchtar Pakpahan in Brussels, and heard his detailed report on the repression unleashed against the SBSI after the Medan events. He also confirmed the death of Sugiarti, another female labour activist, who was killed after she had planned a strike in a shoe and textile factory in Bandung. In June, the ICFTU intervened with the United Nations when Indonesian authorities refused to issue an exit visa to Adi Wiyono, an SBSI activist who the ICFTU had selected to take part in the Manchester Global Forum Conference.
Towards the end of July, the ICFTU again wrote to President Suharto to protest against the arrests of SBSI activists in Tangerang, who had been charged with belonging to a communist organisation and tortured with electric devices. In the letter, the ICFTU also denounced increased military pressure on Muchtar Pakpahan. In August, the ICFTU urged its affiliates to contribute financially to the legal costs of defending SBSI detainees and award organisational aid to the independent union.
The same month, it filed additional evidence of anti-union repression with the ILO, in the framework of its formal complaint lodged in April. In addition to a list of detainees, the report described harassment of SBSI members by government and army officials to force them to relinquish union membership. In mid-August, the ICFTU launched a massive international trade union protest campaign against the arrest of Muchtar Pakpahan and his indictment on charges of incitement related to the April events in Medan.
At the ICFTU's request, the ILO's Director-General also intervened with the Government to obtain Pakpahan's release. The ICFTU appeal met with numerous responses from affiliates and ITS, including protests sent to the authorities, lobbying with affiliates' own governments and demonstrations in front of Indonesia's embassies. Speaking at the UN's Sub-Commission on human rights, which met in August in Geneva, an ICFTU representative also called on the UN's High Commissioner for Human Rights to take up the case of Pakpahan and other SBSI detainees. At the month's end, the ICFTU expressed its support for scores of Indonesian workers who demonstrated outside the Jakarta Public Prosecutor's office in demand for Pakpahan's release.
In September, the ICFTU contacted Pakpahan's lawyers to help organise his defence. It also wrote to affiliates requesting that they urge their respective governments to instruct their diplomats to raise trade union and human rights at the annual meetings of the World Bank and IMF, the following month in Madrid. In October, the ICFTU published a 20-page report on labour rights in Indonesia which criticised Pakpahan's arrest and trial, which had opened the previous month.
In the report, the ICFTU accused the Indonesian authorities of organising a mock trial, whose "sole purpose was to wipe out the independent trade union movement which was developing in the country". Quoting reliable sources inside the country, the report also concluded that violence, which had erupted during the April strikes in Medan, was the work of "agents provocateurs" linked to the security forces.
The document was used by ICFTU affiliates and ITS to step up their campaign on behalf of independent labour activists in the country. Later the same month, the ICFTU released the contents of a letter which it had received from Pakpahan. Written in his Medan jail cell, the letter stated that the Government had offered him his freedom in return for his dissolving the SBSI and joining the SPSI instead. Pakpahan rejected the deal and called for a boycott of Indonesia's exports and for the SBSI's case to be raised during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in November in Jakarta. Soon after, the ICFTU enlisted the help of its Dutch affiliate, the FNV, to ask that a European Union (EU) observer attend Pakpahan's trial in Medan.
The ICFTU-APRO also despatched an observer to attend the last stages of the trial, which concluded with a three year sentence against Pakpahan and similar verdicts against other SBSI leaders from the Medan region. In a strongly worded statement, the ICFTU said that the Government had "in effect put all genuine Indonesian trade unionism on trial, and found it guilty". It also pledged to continue fighting for the unconditional release of Pakpahan and his colleagues. The point was made strongly by the ICFTU General Secretary, when he met a Special Advisor to Indonesia's Labour Minister in November at the ICFTU's Brussels headquarters. Protesting again at Pakpahan's detention and sentence, the ICFTU told the Indonesian representative that his Government had openly showed its intention to crush all independent trade unionism in the country.
In December, the ICFTU Executive Board adopted a comprehensive Resolution on Trade Union and other Human Rights in Indonesia. The Resolution called on the Government to release SBSI detainees immediately and unconditionally, to step up work on revising the country's labour code and to bring industrial relations into conformity with ILO principles. It also expressed regret at the failure of the official centre, SPSI, to react to severe trade union and other human rights violations.
Continuous infringements of international labour standards in the Republic of Korea prompted the ICFTU to intervene repeatedly with the Government. Over 500 independent trade unionists were imprisoned for varying periods under the 1985 National Security Law. In January 1991, the ICFTU called on the authorities to release 260 of them who still remained in detention. In March, the ICFTU-APRO General Secretary, while visiting Seoul, urged Labour Ministry officials to obtain the release of six detained unionists from the Daewoo Shipyards. In July, the ICFTU strongly backed its affiliate, the Federation of Korean Trade Unions (FKTU), whose President, Park Chong-kun went on a hunger strike in protest at the Government's plans to introduce new, anti-union legislation. The plans were dropped one week later.
A wave of industrial disputes in 1992 called for repeated ICFTU support action. In particular, it tried to achieve the rescinding by the Government of a legal prohibition on "third-party intervention", under which unionists were forbidden to advise colleagues on industrial disputes in enterprises other than their own. In June, the ICFTU and ICFTU-APRO started a lengthy campaign with their affiliates and ITS for the lifting of an arrest warrant against Ms. Yan Gun-mo, leader of the independent Korean Federation of Hospital Workers' Unions, who had been accused of "third-Party intervention" in a local-level industrial dispute. She remained in hiding until the arrest warrant was lifted in September 1992 and her union had, meanwhile, been legally registered.
The following year, the ICFTU and ICFTU-APRO organised, in cooperation with the ITS, a major Conference on International Labour Standards and Korea's Labour Law (Seoul, March 1993), with the objective of bringing Korean law into line with ILO standards. In September, however, the ICFTU protested strongly at the Government's announcement that it would delay planned reforms in labour law, in spite of assurances given at the time of the Conference. Meanwhile, in July, the ICFTU condemned an arrest warrant against Dan Byung-ho, President of the independent Korean Trade Unions Congress (KTUC), after the Government put a price on his head. It also called for the release of Hong Young-pyo, a KTUC leader at Daewoo.
Lack of progress on these cases, and a renewed wave of arrests in the summer, prompted the ICFTU to join a formal complaint at the ILO in September (case 1629 of the ILO's Committee on Freedom of Association). The complaint dealt with legal restrictions on the right to organise, the death of a trade union leader and the detention of scores of other unionists, various instances of anti-union discrimination and intimidation, violent repression of union demonstrations and brutal police interventions against striking workers.
In April 1994, the ICFTU congratulated its affiliate on the lifting by the Government of a 36-year ban on May Day celebrations. At the same time, it condemned a US$61,000 strike-damages fine imposed on union activist Dong San-hop at Daewoo. In June, the ICFTU again protested over a wave of 168 arrests of trade unionists: 33 remained in jail at the time, and arrest warrants remained pending against a further 45 activists and leaders of independent unions. These included KTUC President Yang Kyu-lee and Kwon Young-kil, President of the KCIIF independent union federation, both of whom had been involved in an industrial dispute affecting railway and subway workers.
Some weeks later, the ICFTU supported a request of the Education International ITS for an ILO mission to be despatched to Korea to investigate labour standards. The request followed the dismissal of 1,500 teachers for membership of the independent teachers' union, Chunkyojo. Throughout the period under review, several ICFTU protests concerning anti-union measures and tactics were also sent to major Korean employers, including the Daewoo and Hyundai consortiums.
Radical anti-union legislation, introduced after the 1990 election of the conservative National Party, was part of an economic package deregulating the labour market and eroding the welfare state. Despite the strong opposition of the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions (NZCTU) and the most extensive industrial protest in the country's history, the law was passed in May 1991. The Employment Contracts Act was aimed at destroying workers' representation in trade unions. It dismantled the system of regulating employment conditions by collective agreements and awards, removed all legal recognition of the role and obligations of trade unions, outlawed union security arrangements, and limited the right to strike.
The Act established that all work contracts were between the individual and the employer, unless otherwise decided. Groups of workers could choose to be represented by a bargaining agent, which might or might not, be a trade union, in the negotiation of a collective contract which would cover only those workers cited therein. An ICFTU mission visited New Zealand in 1992. In 1993, the ICFTU, FIET, IUF and PSI associated themselves with the NZCTU's complaint to the ILO. In November 1994, the ILO Committee on Freedom of Association found that the Employment Contracts Act was incompatible with freedom of association and the promotion and encouragement of collective bargaining.
The long history of trade union rights violations in Pakistan worsened in the period under review as legislative restraints increasingly excluded workers from union membership and made organising difficult, if not impossible, in many major sectors. Economic restructuring led to privatisation with subsequent job losses and the creation of "trade union-free" special industrial zones. Action to prevent unionisation at the Daewoo Motorway Construction Project led to a series of hostile incidents late in 1992 and early 1993.
Dismissals, threats and beatings of trade union activists trying to organise prompted the ICFTU and IFBWW to submit a case (No. 1726) to the ILO's Committee on Freedom of Association in July 1993. The Committee's interim conclusions a year later urged reinstatement of dismissed workers, requesting "the Government to ... take the necessary measures to guarantee the free exercise of the right of association...". However, the Daewoo case remained unresolved. Repeated appeals and delaying tactics by the government registrar and the Daewoo company kept it entangled in Pakistan's legal system and exploitation of the work force continued.
An ICFTU/ICFTU-APRO secretariat mission met the three local affiliated unions in May 1994 to gather information, investigate problems and discuss the possibility of a coordinated trade union rights campaign. The Human and Trade Union Rights Committee recommended the organisation of such a campaign in Pakistan during its June 1994 meeting. In July 1994, a Council of ICFTU Affiliates in Pakistan was created during an ICFTU/ICFTU- APRO/IFBWW workshop. Affiliates also reached general agreement on a coordinated, eight-part campaign. Initial activities, including training, an organising drive and a pilot school for bonded labourer children, were being explored at the end of the period under review. A report, "Trade Union Rights and Industrial Relations in Pakistan", was produced by the ICFTU in October 1994.
The dissolution of all trade unions in the public services, which appeared to be a central objective of the March 1991 military coup, led to forceful protests to the authorities by the ICFTU, ICFTU-APRO, ITS and affiliates around the world. In May, a delegation led by the ICFTU-APRO General Secretary rejected the Government's formal reply to these representations as unsatisfactory, prompting the ICFTU to lodge a formal complaint at the ILO (Case 1581). The ICFTU Executive Board, meeting in June that year, called for strong pressure to be put on the Government to restore full trade union rights. The same month, however, the Government prevented the holding of a regional ICFTU workshop on trade union rights in the country. It had to be moved to another venue.
Meanwhile, in May 1991, the ICFTU protested at the Government's decision to remove Thanong Podhiarn, President of the ICFTU-affiliated Labour Congress of Thailand (LCT) as Workers' Delegate to the June ILO annual Labour Conference in Geneva. The Government at one point appeared to reverse its decision and allow Thanong to proceed to Geneva. However, he vanished mysteriously in June 1991, on the eve of his scheduled departure. The ICFTU, ICFTU-APRO and affiliates around the world protested strongly and urged the Government to order a comprehensive investigation into the case.
Throughout 1991 and following years, the ICFTU regularly raised this disappearance with the Government. It also enlisted the help of the ILO's Director-General who intervened personally with the Labour Minister in January 1992, but to no avail: Thanong has not been heard of since. It is widely believed that his disappearance was the work of elements of the country's military and security apparatus. Three days before, he had been personally warned about his union activities by the country's Director-General for Employment.
The ICFTU also protested against violent repression of mass pro-democracy demonstrations in the capital, Bangkok, in May 1992, during which at least one prominent trade union leader was arrested. Democratic changes nevertheless occurred after these events and in October, the Government lifted restrictions on organising in the public services, although strikes and work stoppages remained forbidden. However, public services unions remained barred from affiliating with national centres. Violations continued during the period under review, as for example, in June 1993, when the ICFTU intervened with the management of Thai Durable Textiles, Ltd. against the dismissal of 376 workers, including Arunee Srito, President of the National Textile Workers' Union.
The ICFTU continued to monitor developments in Turkey closely and repeatedly expressed its grave concern to the Turkish authorities, as well as to the ILO and the European Parliament, about Turkey's persistent and serious violations of trade union rights. In January 1991, the ICFTU wrote to President Turgut Özal to protest at the arrest of 210 miners during a protest march by 50,000 miners to Ankara, in demand of higher wages and improved working conditions. The detainees were released one week later.
The ICFTU also protested against a decree passed by the Council of Ministers on 26 January, banning all strikes under the pretext of ensuring social order for the duration of the Gulf War. The ban was lifted in March that year. In February, the ICFTU took part in a seminar on trade union and other human rights in Istanbul. The same month, it lodged a complaint at the ILO against Turkey for violations of ILO Convention 87. In May, it added complementary information to the complaint, concerning the confiscation of funds and other assets from the DISK trade union confederation.
In July 1991, in a major positive development stemming from provisions of a new anti-terror law, the Ankara Supreme Military Court of Appeals overruled the 1980 banning of DISK and all the prison sentences imposed on 264 DISK leaders, which ranged from five to fifteen years. This ended the 11 year dissolution of DISK and its affiliated trade unions. DISK resumed its activities. However, legal proceedings went on for the recovery of DISK's funds and assets, which were to be transferred to the Ministry of Labour under the new anti-terror law. On 31 March 1992, the seizure of funds was overruled by Turkey's Constitutional Court.
The ICFTU continued to provide DISK with legal assistance in 1991 and 1992, and made a contribution to organisational assistance. In September 1992, the ICFTU joined the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) in a protest at the Government's lack of concern over the murders of 8 journalists in the predominantly ethnic-Kurd South-east region. According to the IFJ, more journalists had been killed that year in Turkey than in the whole of the rest of the world.
Far-reaching restrictions on trade union rights remained both in Turkey's 1982 constitution, and in Laws 2821 on trade unions and 2822 on strikes, collective bargaining and lock-outs, dating from 1983. This was in spite of the fact that after the October 1991 elections, the incoming Government had announced its commitment to human rights and democratic freedoms and promised "to institutionalise trade union rights in conformity with ILO standards". In February 1993, the ICFTU wrote to Prime Minister Demirel to protest at the treatment meted out to leaders of the Public Service Union, Belediye-IS. They had been attacked by riot-police during a peaceful march to the Finance Ministry, where they intended to discuss a number of demands. In March, the ICFTU welcomed a parliamentary initiative calling on the Government to ratify ILO Convention N- 87.
Among several visits by ICFTU representatives to examine Turkey's trade union rights situation was a visit by the ICFTU General Secretary in 1993. He met Prime Minister Tansu Çiller, and expressed the ICFTU's longstanding and serious concern about the restrictions on trade union rights. Ms. Çiller committed her Government to removing restrictions on the right to freedom of association and collective bargaining.
In 1994, the ICFTU gave its full support to a series of public service strikes, during the course of which scores of workers were arrested, as well as to other trade union action organised jointly by the ICFTU affiliates, Türk-Is and DISK, and the national centre Hak-Is. In January, the ICFTU condemned repression of a national 24-hour strike during which riot-police clashed with unionists in Istanbul, Ankara and other cities. Later that month, the ICFTU made strong protests against the 20 month prison sentence imposed on Münir Ceylan, President of the Petrol-Is trade union who, in a newspaper article, had declared his opposition to the anti-terror law as it related to the situation of the Kurdish people.
In July, the ICFTU expressed support for Türk-IS, DISK and Hak-Is, which launched a major campaign to force the Government to review its austerity programme, under the joint umbrella of the Democracy Platform. At year's end, the ICFTU wrote to the Prime Minister to condemn changes in the proposed 1995 budget, which threatened to deprive public sector workers of the right to organise, to bargain collectively and to strike, in effect eliminating unions from the public sector.
Although the massive violations of human rights, brought about through the war in ex-Yugoslavia, dominated the European scene during the period under review, the region was not spared the overall world trend undermining collective bargaining and the right to strike, and the general erosion of trade union rights.
In Western Europe a number of affiliates resorted to protest actions and campaigns for the defence of trade union rights, and submitted complaints to the ILO against their governments. The ICFTU supported these actions in various ways and joined complainants in ILO cases concerning, for example, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Italy, Malta and Portugal. The ICFTU also supported cases in:
Legislation introduced in 1990 remained in force which limited the right to strike by setting out an extensive list of essential services and enforcing the provision of minimum services during strikes. A series of complaints were submitted by the GSEE in the course of the period under review concerning the restriction or suspension of collective bargaining in the public sector, restriction of the right to strike and interference in trade union affairs. In the course of a massive privatisation drive, eight thousand workers lost their jobs in 1992, following the dismantling of the public transport company EAS in the Attica region by the Government. The Government had previously refused to negotiate with the union.
The ICFTU supported the union and the GSEE in their protests. In 1993, seventeen trade union leaders representing unions in the oil refining, chemicals, power, telecommunications and banking sectors, were detained for two days after seeking a meeting with the Minister of Finance to discuss wide-ranging privatisation plans. A 48-hour strike was held in protest at the arrests.
The ban imposed in 1984, which prevented employees at the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) from joining a union, continued despite the ILO's rulings for it to end. The ICFTU continued to support the TUC's actions at the ILO as well as in the United Kingdom. The GCHQ case was the most flagrant one since 1980 when the Government started to introduce a body of complex anti-trade union legislation affecting the rights to organise, to bargain collectively and to take industrial action.
Legislation adopted in 1992 (Trade Union and Labour Relations/Consolidation Act) and 1993 (Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Act) made it more difficult, and potentially harmful, for working people to join a trade union and take part in trade union activities, because they lacked the basic protections required under ILO conventions. The legislation also interfered with the unions' right to determine their own rules of organisation. Between 1991 and 1993, the TUC submitted complaints to the ILO against anti-union discrimination and the absence of effective legal protection against such discrimination, as well as against the violation of the right to collective bargaining in the public service.
The ICFTU expressed solidarity with its affiliates UGT and ELA/STV when nationwide strikes took place in 1992 and 1994 against the Government's policies to bring the country's economy in line with the European Community through "economic conversion". Workers bore the brunt of this process which, among other things, entailed severe reductions in unemployment benefits and regressive strike legislation. The general strike in 1994 was organised in defence of jobs, living standards and trade union rights.
In 1994 the Spanish parliament froze public sector salaries at the level of 1993. The Regional Government of the Basque Country passed a law to the same effect, thus violating the existing collective agreement. The Basque Regional Government also imposed compulsory arbitration in cases where strikes proved to be particularly successful. It further issued decrees unilaterally imposing a high level of minimum services in all strikes affecting essential services.
In 1993, the ICFTU joined its affiliates LO and TCO in submitting a formal representation to the ILO under the provision of article 24 of the ILO Constitution regarding the non-observance of Convention No. 121 concerning Benefits in the Case of Employment Injury. This followed decisions taken by the parliament which had the effect of rendering agreements concluded between employers and trade unions null and void. In 1994, LO and TCO submitted a complaint to the ILO protesting against violation of the right to collective bargaining. The ICFTU supported its affiliates by joining them as complainant.
As far as Central and Eastern Europe and the CIS were concerned, the ICFTU had to protest to the authorities over violations of trade union rights, non-respect of agreements, or refusal to enter into social dialogue in the following countries: Albania, Belarus, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, ex-Yugoslavia (Serbia, Kosovo), Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovenia and Ukraine (See Chapter XIII).
The ICFTU protested against police intervention in the May 1991 strike organised by the Independent Trade Unions of Albania (BSPS), and provided solidarity assistance to the national centre. The Director of the ICFTU Geneva Office visited Albania in June 1992 to give advice on proposed labour legislation. The ICFTU made representations to the Albanian Government for its return to the ILO, and supported protests of the BSPS with regard to basic trade union rights (curtailments on the right to strike and restrictions in collective bargaining).
Throughout the period under review, the ICFTU had to protest to successive Bulgarian Governments over the deterioration of the industrial relations climate. The Bulgarian Labour Code included various curtailments of trade union rights, which were brought to the attention of the Bulgarian Government (see Chapter XIII).
The human and trade union rights' situation in Croatia was obviously much affected by the war in ex-Yugoslavia, where Croatia was the victim, but also at times the aggressor. Throughout the period under review, the ICFTU monitored violations of trade union and human rights in the country and supported the action of the International Federation of Journalists for greater freedom of the press. Problems related to labour legislation and lack of social dialogue are described in Chapter XIII.
In November 1991, the ICFTU associated itself with the complaint submitted by CS KOS to the ILO against the CSFR Government for adopting a screening law which clearly violated Convention 111 on Discrimination in Employment. In March 1994, CMKOS submitted a complaint to the ILO, backed by the ICFTU, against a draft law which was to ban the activity of trade unions in the public sector and to curtail their right to strike. Efforts were made to introduce a minimum 40 per cent representation for trade unions to be recognized in collective bargaining, as well as an employment card, which would have contravened the right to protection of workers' personal data.
The ICFTU reacted to a constant string of violations of fundamental trade union and other human rights reported during the period under review from Kosovo, a predominantly Albanian-populated region of former Yugoslavia. Kosovo's former autonomous status as a constituent part of ex-Yugoslavia was stripped by Serbia, which took over direct control of the area in 1989. Ethnically based discrimination against Albanians in the region increased notably. It also quickly became a key-component in the political platform of Slobodan Milosevic, at the time poised to become the President of Serbia. A massive wave of dismissals affected hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanian workers; an independent organisation, the Union of Independent Trade Unions of Kosovo (BSPK), was created as a result, representing the overwhelming majority of workers in the region.
The BSPK was systematically harassed by Serbian police and security forces, prompting continuous ICFTU protest to the authorities in Belgrade. In June 1991, the issue of discrimination at work against workers of Albanian descent was the object of a formal ICFTU representation at the ILO under article 24 of the ILO Constitution. This representation, based on systematic violations of ILO Convention No. 111 by the Government of the then Federal Socialist Republic of Yugoslavia, led the ILO to produce a report which fully confirmed ICFTU allegations. Meanwhile, however, the break-up of Yugoslavia and the unresolved issue of the country's succession under international law blocked proceedings against it at the ILO. The special report was thus kept pending in June 1992 without ever being formally adopted or published.
Meanwhile, the ICFTU conducted several investigations on the spot. In March 1991, Xhafer Nuli, a BSPK activist, was arrested while collecting data on repression for an ICFTU mission present in Kosovo at the time. An ICFTU observer was in Kosovo in June the same year, when the BSPK led an attempt to reclaim employment by several thousand dismissed workers. In August, the ICFTU again issued a strong protest against the sacking of 6,000 secondary school teachers and the imposition of oaths of allegiance on 2,000 metal and nickel workers at the Gleygeyc factory. It also criticised the detention of Murat Bejta, a respected literature professor and member of the BSPK national executive council.
The ICFTU approached the Presidents of the Council of Europe and the European Commission, requesting that these institutions condition further relations with the authorities of Serbia on respect of basic human and trade union rights. In September, the ICFTU strongly protested against a sixty day prison sentence imposed on Mufail Zariqi, a BSPK leader in the town of Ferizaj. He suffered constant harassment, detentions, beatings and intimidation after his Municipal Workers' Union demanded a return to constitutional order in Kosovo. This was the first in a series of ICFTU interventions over several years in the case of Zariqi. In September, the ICFTU issued a protest against the detention of three trade unionists, including the then BSPK General Secretary, Burhan Kavaja.
In May 1992, the ICFTU condemned a raid on the BSPK headquarters in Pristina, during which 18 activists were detained and documents were stolen. Two days after the event, the ICFTU, together with the ETUC, urged the European Community to refuse to recognise Serbia/Montenegro as the successor state to former Yugoslavia, until it ceased all acts of aggression against its former sister republics and abided by international human and trade union rights. However, during the night of 22-23 June, Serbian police descended on the BSPK's offices and ransacked the union's headquarters, smashing computers and the photocopier. The office was then closed down by security officials. In October, the ICFTU again wrote to Serbian President Milosevic condemning the arrest of nearly the entire BSPK leadership following a new raid on the union's premises.
In February 1993, the ICFTU sent a protest to the Serbian authorities following the renewed detention and beating of Mufail Zariqi, the BSPK leader in Ferizaj. In May, the ICFTU strongly condemned a violent police raid on the BSPK's headquarters in Pristina, Kosovo's capital. Police smashed computers, confiscated the union's fax and photocopier, and marched seven BSPK activists at gun point to the police station, where they were severely beaten. They were released three days later, after suffering further ill-treatment in detention. In September of the same year, an ICFTU staff member attempted to observe the trial of Zariqi and three other BSPK activists in Ferizaj. However, the trial was postponed indefinitely on its first day, reportedly because of the ICFTU's presence in the courtroom.
Throughout the period under review, the ICFTU endeavoured to co-ordinate its political position and activities relating to ex-Yugoslavia with the ETUC. Indeed, with the exception of resolutions and statements issued by the ICFTU governing bodies, most of the statements and appeals dealing with the war were signed jointly by the ICFTU/ETUC and WCL. The 100th meeting of the Executive Board (November 1991) adopted a statement on the war between the Serbian and Croatian peoples. This supported UN sanctions and reaffirmed the conviction that permanent peace in former Yugoslavia must be based on full respect of democratic freedoms and, in particular, international standards on human and trade union rights.
The ICFTU supported the ETUC's efforts to promote dialogue among unions in ex- Yugoslavia and participated in meetings of ex-Yugoslav trade unions organised by the ETUC and affiliated organisations. The ICFTU supported the appointment of a Special Rapporteur of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights with a mandate to investigate the human rights situation in ex-Yugoslavia. This was reflected in the ICFTU Statement to the First Special Session of the UN Commission on Human Rights, held in August 1992. Thereafter, the ICFTU contributed testimonies to the Special Rapporteur, Tadeusz Mazowiecki. In January 1993, the ICFTU/ETUC issued a statement on Rape and Sexual Abuse by Armed Forces Personnel in Bosnia-Herzegovina and requested the UN Commission on Human Rights to designate rape as a violation of human rights and a war crime. An ICFTU/ETUC observer attended the special hearings on this matter in the European Parliament in February 1993.
The first meeting of the ICFTU Human and Trade Union Rights Committee (May 1993) discussed the situation in ex-Yugoslavia and endorsed the recommendation of the ICFTU Coordinating Committee in this connection. Emphasis was put on monitoring the UN sanctions against Serbia and Montenegro and the ICFTU began compiling information on violations of the embargo. An ICFTU report on the sanctions was published at the end of 1994. ICFTU political statements stressed that economic sanctions needed to be backed by political sanctions.
A survey was carried out in 1994 on the violation of trade union rights in Serbia. The report was discussed at a round-table discussion organised by Serbia's independent union federation, Nezavisnost, at the end of May 1994. Numerous representations were made to the Milosevic regime concerning violations of trade union rights and assistance was provided to Nezavisnost. The ICFTU also supported initiatives undertaken by the International Federation of Journalists in support of the independent media in Serbia.
ICFTU/ETUC/WCL representations throughout the period under review included appeals made at the time of the London Conference (August 1992), Athens Conference (May 1993), and the massacre in Sarajevo on 7 February 1994. After this event, the international trade union movement demanded that those responsible for the massacre be brought before the UN Tribunal for War Crimes in ex-Yugoslavia. The General Secretaries of the ICFTU, ETUC and WCL visited Sarajevo on the occasion of 1 May 1994 as a token of solidarity with the peoples of Bosnia-Herzegovina and to support the action of the Trade Union Confederation of Bosnia-Herzegovina.
The ICFTU mobilised humanitarian assistance for victims of the war and encouraged bilateral efforts to provide such assistance. It endeavoured to monitor human and trade union rights in all the different component States of former Yugoslavia (see Chapter XIII).
The ICFTU continued to monitor the human and trade union rights situation in Romania. It co-operated actively in the work of the ILO Commission of Enquiry set up in June 1989 under Article 26 of the ILO Constitution to examine the application by Romania of Convention 111 of the ILO (Discrimination in Employment). The Commission's report was adopted by the ILO Governing Body during its May 1991 session. The ICFTU Executive Board welcomed the report and its conclusions. Romania's legislation encouraged union fragmentation and severely inhibited the right to strike. The ICFTU made representations to the Romanian authorities several times in support of trade union rights and demands (see Chapter XIII).
Throughout the period under review, the ICFTU made representations to President Yeltsin repeating its call for genuine democratic reforms, which would promote the development of a strong independent trade union movement to defend workers' rights. The ICFTU also supported workers' protests against the chronic non-payment of wages (see Chapter XIII).
In response to a concerted government/employer campaign targetting the independent trade union movement the ICFTU launched a protest campaign in February 1994. Representations were made to the Belarus Government and Parliament.
A joint ICFTU/MIF mission went to Kazakhstan in July 1994 to make representations to the authorities against violations of trade union rights in the Karaganda coalfields. A complaint to the ILO was submitted accordingly.
Representations were made to the Government of Ukraine in September 1992 in support of a strike organised by the five major independent trade unions. In June 1993, the ICFTU wrote to President Kravchuk expressing concern over social tensions and calling for a social dialogue. In July and August 1993, representations were made to the Ukrainian authorities over violations of trade union rights.
During the period under review, the ICFTU lodged protests with the governments of nearly all countries in the region, against serious violations of workers' rights. These included violence, abduction and disappearances, death threats, murder, and violence and intimidation by the police and the armed forces. They also included refusals to grant legal status to trade unions, interference in the internal affairs of trade union organisations, uncontrolled privatisation, the establishment of parallel trade unions, activities by the "Movimiento Solidarista", and violations of trade union rights in "maquiladoras" (export processing zones). It also called regularly upon the members of its Committee on Human and Trade Union Rights to denounce these abuses and join internationally- coordinated protest action.
In addition to ILO procedures against the countries covered separately below, complaints and additional information were presented to the ILO Committee on Freedom of Association regarding the following countries:
Argentina (case 1684, interference in collective bargaining in the port sector; and case 1736, dismissal of trade union activists and discriminatory anti-trade union campaign at the "Lord Cochrane" printing works);
Costa Rica (cases 1678 and 1695, lack of protection from acts of anti-union discrimination, removal of the right to collective bargaining in the public sector, dismissal of striking workers, placing of legal restrictions on the right to strike and anti-trade union activities by "asociaciones solidaristas");
Cuba (case 1628, denial of registration of an independent trade union, attack against, and arrest of, an independent union leader; and case 1805, attacking, intimidating and arresting independent trade unionists and banning a trade unionist from taking part in a meeting of the ICFTU Committee on Human and Trade Union Rights);
Honduras (case 1568, murder of a trade unionist, using violence to quell a strike, taking anti- trade union measures, promoting "asociaciones solidaristas"; and case 1795, dismissing strikers and searching trade union premises);
Peru (case 1813, relating to the murder of the trade union leaders Alipio Chocca de la Cruz and Juan Marcos Donayres Cisneros of the Callao Civil Engineering Workers' Union. The government has replied to the ILO and the ICFTU on this case, informing them that legal proceedings are being taken against three guards charged with causing injury and death to the workers. At the time of writing, the case in the ILO remains pending, until further information is received from the government);
Dominican Republic (case 1549, using violence to quell a strike; and case 1732, mass dismissals of trade union members by companies operating in export processing zones);
Venezuela (case 1676, attempting to murder or arrest a trade union leader, organising anti-trade union campaigns; and case 1797, introducing a bill which would be harmful to trade unions).
A separate mention should be made of case No. 1831 against the government of Bolivia concerning the mass detention (370) and imprisonment of national and regional trade union leaders from the Central Obrera Boliviana (COB), and the harassment and expulsion of the international trade union mission sent by the ICFTU/ORIT and the Southern Cone Trade Union Coordinating Body (of which the COB Bolivia is a member) to this country, on 24 April 1994 to request the release of all the detainees.
The ICFTU also formally associated itself with a significant number of complaints against the government of Canada - both at the Federal and Provincial levels - by its affiliate, the Canadian Labour Congress, concerning mainly the introduction of legislative restrictions on the right to collective bargaining in the public sector (cases 1738, 1758, 1779/1801 and 1802 of the ILO Committee).
Colombia had the highest murder rate in the world and the highest number of assassinations of workers and trade union leaders. Responsibility for the political violence in Colombia lay principally with the State, with 52 per cent of cases attributable to the army and the police and another 20 per cent to paramilitary groups acting in conjunction or with the complicity, or tolerance of, the State. The remainder can be attributed to guerrilla groups, private militia and drug traffickers. In March 1993, the CUT denounced the murder of 1,020 trade unionists since its creation in 1987.
During the period under review, the situation of Colombian workers, particularly that of trade unionists, remained deplorable. The right to life continued to be held to ransom, trade union leaders suffered extra-judicial executions and forced disappearances, while raids on trade union premises, torture and death threats, and internal and external exile persisted. At the same time, neo-liberal policies were implemented, enterprises were privatised or closed, there were mass dismissals of workers in the public sector, and the policy of repression against popular and trade union protest continued.
The new Government of President Ernesto Samper Pizano paid lip-service to the respect of human rights and the implementation of a social policy, but the general situation remained the same. The country continued to have the world's worst record for the murder of trade unionists, particular cases being the deaths of the rural workers belonging to the SINTRAINAGRO union in the Antioquia department and the teachers from the Colombian Federation of Educators (FECODE) at the national level. The right to strike was denied in practice and trade union action was still being met with violence. In the two first months of Ernesto Samper's Government (August - October 1994) 27 trade unionists were murdered.
The process of legal repression, labelled "exceptional" but in fact part of nearly 40 years of a State of Emergency, continued in 1988 with the Decree 180, the "Anti-Terrorist Law" that defined terrorism in such broad terms that a student demonstration, a strike or any riot could be qualified as terrorist action. This decree was used to imprison 13 trade unionists at the state TELECOM company in 1993. The ICFTU/ORIT played a leading role in securing the release of the 13 workers.
In August 1994, the Public Prosecutor of Colombia published the third report on the human rights situation in the country. This explained that the Armed Forces of Colombia were the principal violators of human rights because they applied a counter-insurgent strategy which extended the notion of "the enemy within" to all trade unions, peasants' associations and organised social groups.
The ICFTU maintained its complaints to the ILO (complaints 1434-1477 and 1778), continuing to send supplementary information concerning the disappearance, kidnapping and murder of trade unionists. The Colombian attorney general's office challenged complaints 1434-1477. However, the ICFTU could refute any doubts raised, given that the murders and disappearances concerned were very obvious and easy to prove. Complaints were also lodged with other organisations such as Amnesty International and SOS Torture. ICFTU/ORIT's activities to protect trade unions included assistance to those under threat and transferring some of the persecuted leaders to different regions of the country or other countries of Latin America, helped by the very effective solidarity of certain affiliates.
In the light of this situation, the second meeting of the ICFTU Committee for the Defence of Human and Trade Union Rights (November 1993) approved the ICFTU and ORIT's proposal to carry out a major international campaign on human and trade union rights in Colombia. Before its ratification by the Committee, the ICFTU, ORIT and the Colombian affiliates met to examine the general situation and elaborate projects to turn the campaign into a series of concrete activities. Each project dealt with specific problems faced by the ICFTU's Colombian friends, such as death threats, murder, detentions, dismissals, and judicial repression. The projects covered emergency protection (project I), legal assistance (project II), training activities (project III), publications (project IV) and an international public solidarity event (project V).
During the period under review, the ICFTU wrote on several occasions to the Salvadorian Government to protest at the constant and systematic violations of human and trade union rights in the country. The Government did not reply to any of these communications. The situation concerning the violation of workers' rights in this country was well known. It included incidents such as the kidnapping and disappearance, at the end of April 1993, of a 6 month-old child, the son of Brother Lucas Bernal Mármol, human rights reporter for the Democratic Workers' Centre (CTD).
The ICFTU sent a letter to the President of the country and other governmental authorities to demand a thorough investigation into the incident and that those responsible be brought to justice. It called on all the members of its Committee for the Defence of Human and Trade Union Rights to take similar action to strengthen the pressure on the authorities. The ICFTU also called on the Director General of the ILO to intervene personally to try to ensure that precautionary measures were taken to ensure the child was returned safe and sound. Despite a major campaign, nothing more was heard of the child. Evidence that such practices persisted and that those responsible could make a mockery of the justice system demonstrated the inefficiency of the courts and in many cases their complicity.
The promotion of Solidarismo continued in El Salvador. The employers and the state showed no desire to ratify ILO conventions 87 and 98. Enterprises dismissed workers without respecting any procedures and employers openly slandered the trade unions in the national press. Their aim was to gradually eliminate the trade unions in their enterprises.
After twelve years of war, El Salvador was again attractive to foreign investors who wished to invest in the free trade zones. Employers in the zones resorted to all possible methods to dissuade workers from organising. The 297th report of the ILO's Freedom of Association Committee, dated March - April 1995, contained the complaints lodged by the ICFTU (cases 1693, 1745 and 1757) concerning the mass dismissal of workers for trade union activities, murders, armed attacks, and abuses in the free trade zones.
Guatemala continued to be characterised by extreme violence during the period under review. The situation of the trade union movement remained extremely critical. Full freedom of association did not exist, the right to work was not respected, and threats and persecution continued. Complaints brought before the governmental authorities were not investigated. There were countless disputes, over pay claims or because employers, in collusion with the Government, did not allow workers to organise.
The ICFTU lodged several complaints with the ILO (complaint Nos. 1512-1439), most of which concerned the maquiladora companies, which were the principal violators of trade union rights. As soon as workers decided to form a union, the company threatened to leave the country and so deprive the workers of their jobs. The companies concerned included Agroport, Esdee de Guatemala, Modas J.S., R.C.A, Diseños Y Maquilas, Alimentos Procesados, Exmosa, and Camisas Modernas. They used their own special forces to maintain "order", calling in the police or the army when convenient.
The number of Solidarismo associations had increased since 1989, growing at a faster rate than the unions. Between 1992 and the end of 1994, at least 400 Solidarismo associations were created, most of them in the agricultural sector. The ICFTU lodged a complaint with the ILO's Committee on Freedom of Association (Case No. 1734) concerning a number of Solidarismo violations of trade union rights.
The disorganisation within the Haitian trade union movement reflected the situation in the country. The destruction and pillaging that Haiti had suffered for decades became even worse after the 1991 coup d'‚tat. President Aristide returned to the country in October 1994. The ICFTU, together with its regional organisation for the Americas, ORIT, sent several missions to Haiti to observe at close hand the situation in the country.
In January 1993, a mission led by the ICFTU Assistant General Secretary and the ORIT General Secretary visited the country. It reported that trade unionists had been operating underground, making enormous sacrifices in order to continue their trade union activities. It also reported that the CTH, an affiliate of the WCL-CLAT, and the FOS had not condemned the military coup, and could therefore act openly. Multinational companies continued to operate with a non-unionised work force in the free trade zones. Three leaders of the CGT union had recently been tortured.
An ICFTU-ORIT technical mission visited Haiti from 27 September to 2 October 1993. The mission reported that it was still impossible to carry out any activities owing to the political deadlock in the country. It proposed that the ICFTU campaign for the international isolation of the illegitimate Haitian regime should continue. In October 1994, ORIT held a meeting in Miami with exiled leaders of Haitian trade union organisations. The meeting reached agreements on several points, including action to ensure the immediate return of the exiled leaders, and providing them with the necessary financial support.
In November 1994, the ICFTU Committee on Solidarity with Haiti visited the country. Following this mission, the ICFTU Executive Board decided that an ICFTU/ORIT representative should be stationed in Haiti as soon as possible to continue the dialogue initiated with the democratic Haitian trade unions. The representative would evaluate their long and medium term needs, and respond to the most urgent of them.
The ICFTU constantly denounced violations of trade union rights in Haiti to the ILO. Most of the incidents concerned were contained in complaint number 1628, and the supplementary information to that complaint. The ICFTU also sent letters of protest to the Haitian authorities for the same reasons.
During the period under review, the Paraguayan democratic trade union movement, persecuted and harassed by the dictatorship for so many years, was able to take its place on the national scene. The new era was marked by the foundation of the United Workers' Centre (CUT). The number of unions grew rapidly and a new trade union leadership emerged. However, this process was not accompanied by an improvement in the Government's and employers' attitude towards organised workers.
In post-dictatorial Paraguay, the legacy of the Stroessner regime's labour policies could still be seen. The Government's attitude towards the unions was discriminatory and negligent. Unemployment was on the increase, employment in the informal sector was growing, and migration was again taking place, particularly towards Argentina. Labour legislation designed and applied by the dictatorship was still in force.
Constant violations of human and trade union rights occurred in the review period, the most vulnerable groups being working women and children. The situation of the children working in the streets and markets of the major cities was particularly disturbing. In the last two months of 1992 alone, 1,500 workers lost their jobs for exercising the right to strike and to bargain collectively. They came from the following unions: STICAAP, Frigorífico San Jordi, Co-operative Colonias Unidas, Cerámica Pirayo, Consorcio de Ingeniería Electromecánica, CIE, Molinos Harineros Enrique Remmele, Industrial Jabonera Aregua, and others.
In the first quarter of 1993, the Paraguayan trade union movement had to call on the solidarity of the ICFTU and ORIT on three occasions. In January 1993, 8 union leaders led by brother Victor Baez Mosqueira, President of the United Workers' Centre (CUT), went on a hunger strike for 21 days in protest at the repeated violations of workers' fundamental rights. They resorted to this extreme measure following the dismissal of trade union leaders and activists ordered by the Permanent Conciliation and Arbitration Council. The Council had been created by the Stroessner regime, but, since the promulgation of the new Political Constitution, it no longer had the power to declare strikes illegal or put an end to industrial action.
The ICFTU, ORIT and member organisations of the ICFTU Human and Trade Union Rights Committee constantly intervened before the Paraguayan Government in concrete cases of human and trade union rights violations. The ICFTU on several occasions lodged complaints with the ILO concerning violations of conventions 87 and 98. The latest occasion concerned complaint 1816, for obstructing the freedom of association and attacks on trade unionists.