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In Canada, joint union-management rescue teams succeeded in bringing 72 potash miners who were trapped one kilometre deep in Saskatchewan province to safety. The incident occurred on 29 January when a fire started inside the world&rsquo;s largest potash mine, owned by US-based Mosaic Co., which is controlled by giant foods group Cargill. 
Mine rescue teams from Communications, Energy, Paperworkers (CEP) Union Locals 890 and 892 began tried and tested methods of progressive procedures to rescue the 72 after being trapped for 25 hours. The miners had retreated to sealed refuge stations after the fire&mdash;caused by a cutting torch&mdash;that ignited polyethylene piping. 
Union-management rescue teams, backed by similar rescue teams from nearby unionised potash mines, extinguished the suffocating fires, reached the miners, cautiously vented toxic gas and smoke, and then brought the 72 safely to the surface. The mine has 3,000 miles of underground roads and tunnels covering a 20-mile-wide surface area. 
&ldquo;It really looks like a textbook recovery to me,&rdquo; one former US mine director observed. The trapped miners, however, were unimpressed by the food inside the wet-clay-sealed refuge stations. &ldquo;Ample water but the food sucks &hellip; dry biscuits that are like eating gravel or sand,&rdquo; complained one miner in a local newspaper.

CEP Mine Safety Teams Rescue Potash Miners

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A US District Court issued an injunction against maverick mining company International Coal Group (ICG), 26 January, to prevent the firm from blocking United Mine Workers&rsquo; (UMWA) union investigators from the Sago Mine in the state of West Virginia. Twelve miners were killed inside the mine on 2 January. 
UMWA does not represent Sago&rsquo;s 150 miners, but many workers there requested that UMWA take part in the follow-up probe, an action both lawful and binding under the US Mine Safety &amp; Health Act (MSHA). ICG prevented UMWA investigators from entering the jobsite, using security guards to deny access. ICG quickly appealed the injunction obtained by the agency that oversees MSHA, but an appellate court in Richmond, Virginia, denied reviewing it. 
The US company now must allow UMWA to investigate IGC and Sago&rsquo;s horrid and deadly safety practices. With energy demand and high coal prices driving the reopening of closed coal shafts in the US East, other coal mine fatalities have occurred in West Virginia in the wake of Sago. 
On 19 January, a conveyer belt fire at Aracoma Coal&rsquo;s Alma Mine in Melville caught fire, trapping and killing two. On 31 January, two separate deaths occurred; one when a wall collapsed, killing a miner at Long Branch Energy&rsquo;s Wharton mine, the other when an operator on a bulldozer at Massey Energy&rsquo;s Black Castle surface mine struck a gas pipeline. The total of 16 mine deaths in West Virginia since 2 January exceeds the entire 2005 death count, which was three. 
In contrast, and also on 31 January, some 1,000 miles west, 90 miners and UMWA members at Freemen United Coal Co., near Gilead, Illinois, were evacuated after high levels of carbon monoxide were detected by UMWA-operated equipment inside the mine. UMWA teams safely brought the trapped miners to the surface, and the mine will remain closed pending an investigation.

UMWA Mine Safety Teams Succeed in US

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After meeting with the government last week, ICEM oil union affiliates NUPENG and PENGASSAN have given a two-week deadline to improve security in the Niger Delta, or strike plans will start. 
On 30 January, four kidnapped subcontractors of Shell were released, after 19 days, but further acts of violence by youth and other heavily-armed groups in the oil-rich delta continue. Two weeks ago a group attacked the offices of Italian-based Eni&rsquo;s Agip Mgboshimini base in Port Harcourt. Two banks there also were attacked. Eleven were killed, including police officers, and several others were injured. Following the raids and killings, Eni pulled all its workers from the city. 
<img height="83" alt="" src="" width="80" />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp; <img height="79" alt="" src="" width="75" />
On 28 January, 20 gunmen stormed Daewoo Engineering &amp; Construction Co. and got away with US$300,000 in cash. Crime-prone groups threaten all foreign-owned oil and support companies, and even target tanker-truck drivers. 
The unions have called for an end to the reckless lawlessness, and call on the government to come up with meaningful solutions to alleviate poverty in the Niger Delta. 
NUPENG President Peter Akpatason said current governmental agencies are not fulfilling their proper roles, which is to create jobs for young people. &ldquo;Any attempt at solving the crisis in the region, the level of degradation, the level of poverty without thinking how to create jobs&hellip;will not achieve anything,&rdquo; he told the publication Vanguard. &ldquo;However, we condemn in its entirety the idea of attacking oil facilities and most especially workers.&rdquo;

Oil Unions Take Niger Delta Initiatives to Halt Violence

A torch-lit parade and protest in the Belgian city of Gent against the retaliatory measures of paper company Stora Enso has the full endorsement of Brussels-based ICEM, the Global Union Federation representing pulp and paper trade unions across the world. 
 
The parade and protest, to be held beginning at 19h00 on Tuesday, 7 February, is sponsored by the Gent-Dendermonde Region of ICEM affiliate De Algemene Centrale ABVV (La Centrale G&eacute;n&eacute;rale FGTB). The march will convene in front of ABBV&rsquo;s regional headquarters at Vrijdagmarkt (Friday Market), 9000 Gent, and after assembly, will proceed for one hour through the city streets of Gent. 

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The retaliation involves the sudden dismissal of two ABVV shop stewards at Stora Enso&rsquo;s Langerbrugge paper mill on 30 December. Mill Management executed legal papers for their dismissal and had constables deliver the termination notices to their homes. 
 
The union protested directly to Stora Enso, and alerted the Finnish-Swedish paper company that it had 30 days to reinstate the pair to their rightful jobs, or it would set the Belgian legal process in play. The company, responding through its law firm, said that if ABVV/FGTB filed legal action for compensatory damages for the two, it would sue ABVV/FGTB for business losses connected to a short, but legal strike last fall that the union and two other trade unions conducted. 
 
Such a lawsuit against a union is unprecedented and currently not possible in Belgian courts due to the legal definition of a trade union. But right-wing political parties inside Belgium are pushing for a legislative debate on holding unions responsible for financial restitution during a work stoppage, and Stora Enso has now entered that debate. 
 
Tuesday&rsquo;s event will showcase the necessity to strengthen workplace protections for on-the-job trade union leaders. And Stora Enso&rsquo;s anti-worker practices at Langerbrugge will be shown as the shameful example of anti-social behaviour in Belgium. 
 
&ldquo;This march is intended for the citizens and politicians of Belgium and to alert them that current law protecting shop stewards is inadequate,&rdquo; said Katrien Van der Heist, regional Secretary for De Algemene Centrale. &ldquo;It is clear to us that Langerbrugge management holds our two shop stewards responsible for the strike, and this is illegal.&rdquo; 
 
But under Belgian law, a trade union&rsquo;s only legal recourse is to seek a fine against the company and compensation for the individuals, but not reinstatement. &ldquo;This is something that must change,&rdquo; added Van Der Heist. &ldquo;We must make the law stricter and force companies to take back union representatives who are fired for carrying out their legitimate duties.&rdquo; 
 
The sackings came as a result of a 12-day strike by 330 workers at the Langerbrugger newsprint and publication papers mill from 28 October to 8 November, 2005. During that strike, mill management used coercive tactics by petitioning a Gent court to impose a &euro;1,000-a-day fine on the union and its representatives for each worker that did not cross picket lines. The company also publicly declared that its concessionary proposals would only get worse each day that the strike lasted. (Further information on that strike can be found at <a href="/?id=19&amp;doc=1482 &amp;la=EN">/?id=19&amp;doc=1482 &amp;la=EN</a> and <a href="/?id=19&amp;doc=1485&amp;la=EN">/?id=19&amp;doc=1485&amp;la=EN</a>.) 
 

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From left: CEP President Brian Payne, ABVV Regional Secretary Katrien Van der Helst,and FGTB/ABVV National Federal Secretary Bruno Bachely.
Stora Enso also took indirect action against two ABVV shop stewards of cleaning contractor ACS. They informed the contractor that the stewards could not work inside Langerbrugge under threat of ACS losing the cleaning contract. The two women shop stewards had stopped by picket lines during the strike to express solidarity. 
 
The torch-lit march through the streets of Gent comes 12 days after the world&rsquo;s largest pulp, paper and paperboard company locked out 600 members of ICEM affiliate Communications, Energy, Paperworkers (CEP) Union of Canada at a mill in Port Hawkesbury, Nova Scotia. (For information on the lockout, see <a href="/?id=77&amp;doc=1635&amp;la=EN">/?id=77&amp;doc=1635&amp;la=EN</a>.) Brian Payne, president of CEP, was in Brussels yesterday and not only pledged a presence at the parade, but also pledged a continued link of solidarity and communication between CEP Local 972 in Nova Scotia and Belgian ABVV-FGTB.

Stora Enso Retaliates Against Union Leaders in Gent, Belgium

The 20-million-member ICEM, the Global Union Federation representing workers and trade unions in the pulp and paper sector, has denounced Stora Enso&rsquo;s attempts to break from the pattern paper agreement in eastern Canada over contracting out work at its mill in Port Hawkesbury, Nova Scotia. 
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The company locked out 600 members of Communications, Energy, Paperworkers (CEP) Union of Canada - an ICEM affiliate - on 26 January after members of CEP Local 972 rejected a bargaining proposal that contained provisions giving managers unprecedented rights to outsource unionised work. 
 
&ldquo;Paper companies in Eastern Canada have agreed to a status quo on existing contract-out letters and memorandums with our affiliate,&rdquo; stated ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs. &ldquo;Stora Enso&rsquo;s attempt to break from this pattern is unacceptable and the ICEM will support paperworkers at Stora&rsquo;s only Canadian paper mill in every way possible.&rdquo; 
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In a letter to Stora Enso CEO Jukka H&auml;rm&auml;l&auml; in Finland, Higgs urged the world&rsquo;s largest pulp and paper producer to return to bargaining immediately. &ldquo;The ICEM strongly urges you to personally intervene to amicably resolve this dispute,&rdquo; wrote Higgs. &ldquo;We appeal to you to apply the principled custom of Nordic fairness and to direct North American managers to immediately reopen dialogue with the CEP to resolve this dispute.&rdquo; 
 
The ICEM received assurances from CEP President Brian Payne that the union is willing to reconvene bargaining immediately. 
<img height="128" alt="" src="" width="90" />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;<img height="128" alt="" src="" width="100" /> 
Brian Payne, CEP President, and Fred Higgs, 
ICEM General Secretary
CEP Local 972 members in Port Hawkesbury rejected Stora Enso&rsquo;s proposal with better than an 80% vote late on 25 January. The next morning the company began the lockout after issuing a 48-hour lockout notice under provincial labour code on 28 December. The two sides had been in non-stop bargaining for eight days leading up to the company&rsquo;s demands for contracting-out changes on 18 January. Such changes would eliminate jobs and severely inhibit job security, said the ICEM. 
 
Stora Enso and the CEP, which has been without a current labour agreement at Port Hawkesbury since 31 May 2004, have agreed on economic aspects contained in the paper sector pattern agreement reached with all companies with operations in Eastern Canada. 
 
The issue of contract and agency labour has become a central campaign issue for the ICEM on a global basis. The Brussels-based GUF believes the rush to utilise contractors and agencies by multinational companies in place of full-time, directly-employed workers is destructive to communities. 
 

<hr />
To read the ICEM letter to the company, <a href="/index.php?id=19&amp;doc=1636&amp;la=EN">click here</a>.

ICEM Cites Stora Enso for Breaking from Pattern on Contract Labour in Canada

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The contentious dispute between ICEM German affiliate IGBCE and Continental Tyre over 320 job cuts by year-end 2006 at the St&ouml;cken plant in Hannover, Germany, was resolved Tuesday evening, 24 January, in negotiations between the two sides and the Works Council of the plant.
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In the tentative agreement that is expected to be finalised in February, the German tyre-maker has agreed to return to an agreement put in place in May 2005. That agreement called for no job cuts before the end of 2007. Throughout 2007, Continental will offer job opportunities to St&ouml;cken workers in other facilities and also offer early retirement options to eligible workers. In addition, the company will make research and development investments at the St&ouml;cken plant.
IGBCE board member Werner Bischoff said the union succeeded in preserving the future of Hannover&rsquo;s Continental facilities, as well as making a stand that last May&rsquo;s agreement cannot be undermined.

Pact Reached in Germany Between IGBCE, Continental Tyre

For the urgent attention of His Majesty 
King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev 
Narayanhity Royal Palace 
Durbar Marg 
Kathmandu 
Nepal 
 
By fax: +977 14 413577 and +977 14 228235 
 
 
Brussels, 24 January 2006 
 
 
King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev, 
 
I am writing as General Secretary of the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM), in the name of the 20 million members that we represent worldwide in over 120 countries, to protest the ongoing repression in Nepal against numerous trade union leaders. 
 
Over the course of the past week, as your regime began preventing planned pro-democracy demonstrations and engaged itself in a brutal and repressive wave against peaceful protests, a large number of trade union leaders were arrested, together with many other leaders and activists from other organisations. 
 
Amongst the trade unionists arrested were GEFONT Chairperson Makunda Neupane and Gefont Secretary-General Binod Shrestha, as well as Ms. Manju Bhattarai, NTUC Central member and Mr Radheshyam Pathak, NTUC District President. 
 
We are calling upon you to ensure the immediate release of all trade union leaders and members that have been arrested over the last few days, as well as for the release of all political leaders and activists that are currently in detention. 
In addition, we understand that the curfew that was in place since 16 January has now been lifted in Kathmandu and its neighbouring city Lalitpur. However, much more remains to be done in order to put your country on the path to democracy. For example, new curfews have been announced, and others remain in place, and these should be lifted. I would like to urge you to rescind these curfews as a matter of priority. 
Thanking you in advance for your kind cooperation 
 
Yours sincerely, 
 
Fred Higgs 
General Secretary

ICEM Letter to King of Nepal

China&rsquo;s coal mines have come under global scrutiny due to weekly disasters that claim the lives of thousands of miners each year. But yet another mine disaster this past weekend has gained headlines. On 20 November, a mass fire spreading across five iron ore mines in Shahe city, Hebei province, claimed the lives of 57 miners with another three still missing. The fire in the privately-run mine was caused by an electric cable that ignited and then spread when flames engulfed wood pillars.

Chinese Iron Ore Operations Latest to Face Safety Deaths

Swedish affiliate Sif held its Congress in G&ouml;teberg on 15-18 November and used a novel working method to discuss issues that replaced lengthy plenary sessions common to many congresses. The 180 delegates attending participated in 11 detailed consultative sessions that were aided by networked computers. The system, first introduced at the 2000 Congress but further refined at last week&rsquo;s event, facilitated much greater delegate participation in producing consultative documents and summaries of spontaneous discussions. These were then put to a final plenary for approval. Delegates also re-elected President Mari-Ann Krantz and elected two new Vice Presidents, Peter Hellberg and Stefan Carlsson.

Sif of Sweden Holds Congress

ICEM Belgian affiliate la Centrale G&eacute;n&eacute;rale FGTB held its Congress in Blankenberge 17-20 November with a theme entitled &ldquo;Delegates Without Borders for More Social Justice.&rdquo; The theme was a call to union activists to go beyond the &ldquo;borders&rdquo; of enterprises and conduct union work on international and European levels. The Congress debated global and European issues with emphasis on creating trade union networks. The Congress also marked the retirement of five members of FGTB&rsquo;s Federal Secretariat with Alain Clauwaert elected new President and Jacques Michiels as General Secretary. Other members of the Secretariat include Werner Van Heetvelde, Paul Lootens, Rik Desmet, Bruno Bachely, Herman Baele and Eric Neuprez.

Belgian Affiliate la Centrale Generale FGTB Holds Congress

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