Monthly Archives: May 2016

This week, thousands of workers at the Gadani shipyards, near Karachi in Pakistan, took action to demand the reinstatement of hundreds of sacked workers. Workers had been demanding safer working conditions. Unfortunately the Gadani shipbreaking yards have a long history of unsafe practices, leading to many deaths (see here and […]

Last week, the Supreme Court of India helped to expose the ongoing disaster that is affecting quarry workers in the north western state of Gujarat. The court directed the Gujarat state government to finally pay compensation to over 200 families who had lost a family member due to the lung […]

The issue of insecure work affects workers all over the world, and in the Philippines it has come to prominence during the recent presidential elections. It is in this context that the members of PALEA are calling on the new Filipino President to pressure Philippines Airlines to honour the agreement […]

Australian coal workers had thought that pneumoconiosis, or as it is commonly called, ‘black lung disease’, was a disease that had been relegated to history after workers won better working conditions. But the capitalists have been systematically pushing back and making our workplaces unsafe in service of higher profits. Due […]

Australia marked National Sorry Day on 26 May, a day to remember and commemorate the attempted genocide of the country's Aboriginal people. While many events were held, the reality is that the oppression and dispossession of Australia’s Indigenous peoples continues (see here, here, here and here). Aboriginal workers had their […]

Earlier this month, hundreds of workers in East Timor marched calling for an increase to the minimum wage. The minimum wage has not been revised since 2012 and is only around 50% of what an average family needs to live on. East Timor is a relatively young nation where workers […]

In the middle of April there were unprecedented protests by thousands of garment workers in the southern Indian city of Bangalore. These protests were heavily repressed with many workers injured. Over 300 workers are now facing charges following these protests. Raising bail for all defendants has put a lot of […]

Earlier this week, an international delegation visited the capital of Seoul to support the ongoing campaign to free the jailed leaders of the KCTU and to highlight the ongoing harassment of others. In other labour news, thousands of unionists marched onto the headquarters of the giant automaker Hyundai to protest […]

Earlier this week, five workers employed at the Maxen Plastic Factory in the Korangi Industrial Area were sent to clean a chemical tank. They were not provided with any specialised breathing equipment and they were killed by the fumes. Unfortunately these are not the first deaths of this kind in […]

Last Friday, thousands of working class Iraqis once again broke through the fortified barriers around the Green Zone in Baghdad and managed to enter parliamentary offices. Unlike the previous month, many demonstrators were shot and an unknown number were killed and injured. This latest mass demonstration is a continuation of […]