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Global Labour Forum to be organised at International AIDS Conference 
 
As Canada prepares itself to host the 16th International AIDS Conference in Toronto, 13-18 August, the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) will conduct a comprehensive assessment of the impact and effectiveness of HIV/AIDS policies and actions on workers and workplace at national and international levels. The review will form the foundation of a Global Labour Forum on HIV/AIDS organised by the CLC in conjunction with the Conference. 
 
The Canadian HIV/AIDS Labour Fund, launched by the CLC, works closely with unions that actively promote the rights of workers to fair treatment and provide workplace-based information on protection against the disease and prevention of its spread. Canadian unions, in cooperation with the Canadian International Development Agency, pioneer innovative and gender-sensitive AIDS prevention and advocacy campaigns in a number of developing countries. 
 
(Source: CLC Press Release) 
 
Information on the International AIDS Conference can be accessed at <a href="http://www.aids2006.org">www.aids2006.org</a>. 
 
Second Line ARVs Too Costly for Patients Warns MSF
Now that first-line treatment has come down to less than US$200 per patient per year, concern is rising that an increasing number of HIV patients does not respond to first-line treatment anymore and has to move to second-line drugs, which are much more expensive and therefore harder to access. 
 
Taking the example of Kenya, the international humanitarian organisation Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) says that for second-line drugs it has to pay US$ 1,400 per patient per year. In a clinic in South Africa, MSF is treating 58 patients on second-line drugs at the same cost as 550 on first-line drugs. 
 
Expanding relatively affordable first-line treatment will inevitably lead to a higher demand for more expensive second-line treatment in the years to come. Failing to switch from first-line treatment, which has become ineffective due to side effects and growing drug resistance, to second-line drugs is a death sentence for the patient. 
 
According to MSF, part of the problem lies in the continuing insistence of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) on adherence to strict patent protection, as well as cumbersome regulations that developing countries have to follow to take advantage of concessions. 
In early 2005, the WTO’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) was implemented in India and other developing countries that had not yet granted full pharmaceutical patents. This widespread patent protection is stifling the production of much-needed cheaper generics, which are as effective. 
 
(Source: The East African, Nairobi, posted on <a href="http://www.allafrica.com">www.allafrica.com</a> on 4 January) 
 
Half of Companies See Future AIDS Impact 
 
Companies around the world are becoming increasingly concerned about AIDS, with 46% now expecting some impact in the next five years, as compared to 37% in the same study a year ago. The survey was released on 11 January by the Global Health Initiative of the World Economic Forum prior to the meeting of the WEF in Davos, Switzerland. 
Although nearly half of the almost 11,000 corporate leaders in 117 countries surveyed recognised that HIV/AIDS would hurt their business in future, only 9% had conducted a quantitative risk assessment. Furthermore, it is only in regions where HIV prevalence exceeds 20% that the majority of firms have formal HIV/AIDS policies in place. Where the incidence is lower only a small proportion of companies have enacted policies. 
 
(Source: WEF-GHI website. The survey entitled, “Business and HIV/AIDS: A Healthier Partnership?” can be accessed at <a href="http://www.weforum.org">www.weforum.org</a>) 
 
Once-a-Day AIDS Pill Shows Promise 
 
A once-a-day AIDS treatment, the first of its kind, has been jointly developed by multinational drug firms Gilead and Bristol-Myers Squibb, and could soon outrun three-times-a-day regimens. According to research published in the latest New England Journal of Medicine, the manufacturers found the new drug especially effective in suppressing HIV viral loads and having fewer side effects than commonly used antiretrovirals. It is hoped to obtain approval by the end of 2006. 
 
No cost of the treatment is yet available. AIDS treatment activists have demanded that the drug be marketed at an affordable price for developing countries where simplified regimens are most needed. 
 
(Source: UN Integrated Regional Information Networks, posted on <a href="http://www.allafrica.com">www.allafrica.com</a> on 20 January) 
 
China: Number of People Living with HIV/AIDS Down 
 
Figures jointly released by China’s Ministry of Health, the WHO and UNAIDS on 25 January, estimated the number of people living with HIV/AIDS at 630,000 in 2005, down form an estimate of 840,000 in 2003. This is not a success story in prevention but rather due to errors in estimates of people getting infected by blood donations in previous years. 
The survey therefore cautioned against complacency, saying the figure was still rising and the virus is spreading from high-risk groups to the general population. Experts have warned that China’s increasingly mobile population faces a broader risk as more infections occur through drug injection and sexual contact. 
 
(Source: Reuters World Report, 25 January) 
 
UNGASS Review 
 
This year, the United Nations General Assembly will undertake a comprehensive review of the progress made in achieving the targets agreed by member states at the 2001 General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on HIV/AIDS, and set in place the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS. The review will take place during a high-level meeting at the UN Head Office in New York from 31 May to 2 June. 
 
Update from ILOAIDS 
 
You can access news from around the world on HIV/AIDS and the world of work on the ILOAIDS website <a href="http://www.ilo.org/public/english/protection/trav/aids/index.htm">http://www.ilo.org/public/english/protection/trav/ 
aids/index.htm</a> and click on News from around the world or go directly to <a href="http://www.newsnow.co.uk/clients/ilo/results.html?keyword=AIDS">http://www.newsnow.co.uk/clients/ilo/results.html?keyword=AIDS</a>  
 
Under Core Documents on the ILOAIDS website, you find the ILO Code of Practice and the Education and Training Manual implementing the ILO Code of Practice and the world of work. 

REMINDER TO ICEM AFFILIATES 
 
This is your newsletter – contribute to it! 
 
ICEM affiliates are already engaged in a wide range of activities, some have formal agreements with companies; others run education and awareness programmes at the workplace. To spread the information on new agreements and campaigns and to build on best practices, affiliates and project coordinators are invited to send news and information to hiv.aids@icem.org. Any feedback on the format and contents of the e-bulletin is also welcome. 
 
This ICEM HIV-AIDS Newsletter – How to Subscribe or Translate? 
 
To subscribe to the e-bulletin, send an email to <a href="mailto:press@icem.org">press@icem.org</a>. Please put “subscribe ICEM HIV/AIDS e-bulletin” in the subject line. 
 
Unfortunately, the e-bulletin can only be published in English. For a free automated (non-ICEM) translation of this HIV-AIDS bulletin into other languages, you may want to try <a href="http://babelfish.altavista.com/tr">http://babelfish.altavista.com/tr</a> or <a href="http://www.google.com/language_tools">http://www.google.com/language_tools</a> and insert the following URL into the window “Translate a Web page“: 
<a href="/index.php?id=72&la=EN&doc=1634" type="internal">/index.php?id=72&la=EN&doc=1634</a>.

ICEM HIV/AIDS e-bulletin - No. 5

The 20-million-member ICEM, the Global Union Federation representing workers and trade unions in the pulp and paper sector, has denounced Stora Enso’s attempts to break from the pattern paper agreement in eastern Canada over contracting out work at its mill in Port Hawkesbury, Nova Scotia. 
<img height="83" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/canadacep.gif" width="100"/>
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. 
 
“Paper companies in Eastern Canada have agreed to a status quo on existing contract-out letters and memorandums with our affiliate,” stated ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs. “Stora Enso’s attempt to break from this pattern is unacceptable and the ICEM will support paperworkers at Stora’s only Canadian paper mill in every way possible.” 
<img height="180" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0601Canada1.jpg" width="120"/>
 
In a letter to Stora Enso CEO Jukka Härmälä in Finland, Higgs urged the world’s largest pulp and paper producer to return to bargaining immediately. “The ICEM strongly urges you to personally intervene to amicably resolve this dispute,” wrote Higgs. “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.” 
 
The ICEM received assurances from CEP President Brian Payne that the union is willing to reconvene bargaining immediately. 
<img height="128" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0601CEPBrianPayne.jpg" width="90"/>      <img height="128" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Fredhiggs.jpg" width="100"/> 
Brian Payne, CEP President, and Fred Higgs, 
ICEM General Secretary
CEP Local 972 members in Port Hawkesbury rejected Stora Enso’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’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&doc=1636&la=EN" type="internal">click here</a>.

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

<img height="40" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief1.gif" width="100"/> 
Turkish ICEM affiliate Petrol-Iş again successfully dampened Turkey’s privatisation attempts of state-run oil refiner Tupras by winning a Council of State judicial decision on 2 February. 
The decision by the Council, Turkey’s highest administrative court, suspends the sale of 51% of Tupras to a consortium led by Turkey’s Koc Holdings and Royal Dutch Shell. Only a week earlier, the consortium transferred US$4.14 billion to the Privatisation Administration Council for the 51% stake. But the court, acting on an appeal by Petrol-Iş, struck down the sale, saying it had failed to comply with privatisation law. 
<img height="80" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/TurkeyFlag.gif" width="120"/>
The union has been conducting day-long strikes at the four refineries and at one petrochemical plant of Tupras, as well as holding massive strikes at workplaces on 26 January, the day Koc and the government rushed through the finalisation of the deal. Petrol-Iş has been conducting—and continues to—a campaign called “Tupras is Our Future, It Cannot Be Sold Off” in the form of billboards, print and television announcements, and other medium directed at Turkey’s citizens. 
Last week’s court decision, according to Platt’s Commodity News, provoked panic shares’ selling of both Tupras and of Koc’s liquid petroleum gas subsidiary, Aygaz, on the Istanbul Stock Exchange. Petrol-Iş has now won some five court and regulatory agency rulings against gas and oil refinery privatisations using both legal means and public campaigns.

Turkish Petrol-Iş Again Blocks Tupras’s Oil Privatisation

The 20-million-member ICEM today condemns King Gyanendra and his autocratic rule in Nepal for the arrests and intimidation of dozens of pro-democracy activists in the days leading up to a four-day general strike beginning tomorrow, 6 April. The ICEM also condemns the absolute monarchy’s threat to civil servants and professionals, who have been served notice that participation in the strike could mean dismissals or job transfers to remote areas of the Himalayan country. 
 
Specifically, the ICEM calls attention to the arrest yesterday of General Federation of Nepalese Trade Unions (GEFONT) official Ramesh Badal. He was seized in New Baneswer as he was speaking to the Professional Alliance on joining the strike. Badal heads GEFONT’s Department of Labour Relations. 
<img height="137" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0604NepalBadal.jpg" width="131"/> 
 
Ramesh Badal
“Arrests of activists before major strikes and demonstrations have become all too common in Nepal,” said ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs. “But this makes them no less appalling. Real rights and freedoms will not exist until Nepal’s monarch lifts his absolute rule and allows political parties to function.” 
 
The ICEM, a Global Union Federation consisting of 389 affiliates in 122 countries, including four in Nepal, supports the 6-9 April general strike as a means of challenging Gyanendra’s autocratic rule, now in place for 14 months. This week’s general strike is being called by a wide ranging political coalition called the Seven Parties Alliance. The royal government has countered the strike with prohibition orders banning all assemblies inside the greater Kathmandu area.

ICEM Condemns Arrests, Repression Leading to General Strike

Twenty years after the world’s worst nuclear disaster at Chernobyl, some 4,000 workers employed in the contamination exclusion zone regularly face non-payment of wages, lack of funding for equipment, clothing and other essentials, and general disregard by Ukrainian government authorities. 
ICEM affiliate Atomprofspilka, the Nuclear Power Workers’ Union of Ukraine, represents most workers inside the zone, and continually is drawn to the needs and grievances of workers of the different enterprises operating in the 30-kilometre exclusion zone. 

<img height="113" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/UKRAINEAtomprofspylka.jpg" width="115"/>
Earlier this year, workers at the government-operated EcoCentre—the agency charged with monitoring radiation levels and other hazards—declared a labour dispute when wages went unpaid. At another enterprise, ChernobylService, funding is virtually non-existent for special clothing and even soap and detergents for the 1,350 workers. 
 
Nikolai Teterin, a member of Atomprofspika’s Executive Committee, believes the central tenet to current problems is that the Ukrainian government has adopted no work plan for the zone. He says all budgets and proposals put forward by the Ministry for Emergency Situations are ignored by the Ministry of Finance. When workers employed inside the zone press their claims in court, the Cabinet of Ministers contests each case filed. 
 
“This is characteristic of the government’s attitude on the problems inside the exclusion zone 20 years following the disaster,” said Teterin. “We maintain the infrastructure in its normal condition and make sure that radionuclides do not get beyond the zone. We monitor the water bodies, the forest, yet the situation is that qualified and dedicated specialists are leaving because they cannot afford to work for miniscule wages, which are not even paid on time." 
 
In the morning of 26 April 1986, a loss of coolant inside Chernobyl’s reactor No. 4 forced the reactor power to increase several times the normal maximum causing a massive explosion. The 100-ton reactor lid blew into the sky, and for nine days after, fire raged. 
 
But in the years that followed, particularly with the break-up of the Soviet Union in other nation-states, little was done in the way of social protections and ensuring the necessary infrastructure for Ukrainian workers. 
 
For the enterprises inside the exclusion zone, the process is the same each year, according to Gennady Mikhailuk, deputy president of the Chernobyl territorial union organisation. “We try to prove to the state what is needed and exactly what tasks must be done,” he said. “The only funding that comes arrives from whatever is left from other expenditures, and that is very little.” 
 
Nikolai Novgorodsky, the workplace leader at the TechnoCentre, “We have been writing about all our problems to zone management, but one gets the feeling they just don’t hear us up there.” 
 
A 1991 law protecting the life standards of those working inside the zone, as well as citizens who were victimised by the disaster, was suppose to provide adequate financial support to exist in the zone. But the financial support inside the law has simply eroded, said Atomprofspilka’s Chairman of the Workplace Conveners Council Sergei Budyansky. For example, proper nutritional and dietary care was intended for employees forced to work inside the contaminated zone. The meal stipend today for three daily meals is stuck at 6.26 Gryvnas, equivalent to € 1. 
 
“Now, is that adequate money to provide meals to people who do physically hard work, in the open air, in a territory that is contaminated with radionuclides?” asks Budyansky. 
 
ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs has visited Chernobyl twice in recent years. The ICEM has been a leading global advocate for a two-prong response to the consequences of the Chernobyl disaster. One was for international financial institutions and the world community, after the closure of the plant in year 2000, to come to the assistance of Ukraine to develop new power sources. The other is to ensure a comprehensive solution to the social problems of personnel in and around the facility. 
 
“It is quite clear that the social provisions of workers employed inside the 30-kilometre radius of the plant have not been met,” said Higgs. “There is far more that the Ukrainian government must do, and the international community must step up to ensure that these workers are not only fully compensated, but also treated with dignity and provided with the maximum possible protection.”

Forgotten Workers Inside Chernobyl’s Exclusion Zone

Chernobyl’s Workers of Today Endure Horrid Conditions

President Roh Moo-hyun 
1 Sejong-no, Jongno-ku, 
Seoul 110-820 
Republic of Korea 
 
By fax: +82-2-770.03.44  
By e-mail <a href="mailto:president@cwd.go.kr">president@cwd.go.kr</a> 
 
 
Dear Mr. President, 
 
I am writing, after having been informed by the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM), to protest against the ongoing trade union repression in your country of the members of the Korean Chemical and Textile Workers’ Federation (KCTF) at GS Caltex. 
 
The anti-union behaviour by GS Caltex started in 2004 when the company, with the help of the Korean police, aggressively retaliated against a strike that was organized by the workers at GS Caltex. The strike was the result of the company’s decision to disregard a set of reasonable union demands, which were on issues such as a five-day, 40-hour work-week and the non-discrimination of contract workers. 
 
After the brutal suppression of the strike, GS Caltex continued to hit back at the union’s members and leaders by selecting at the gate who could return and who could not. This also happened with the assistance of the police, who remained stationed inside the company for 52 days. GS Caltex also harassed families of workers and ended up dismissing almost all union officials, 30 in number. In addition, eight trade union leaders were arrested and sentenced to periods of two to three years in prison. A total of 650 other workers were disciplined with three-month suspensions from work. 
 
Since then, the company has refused to bargain in good faith with the workers, whose situation and future remains extremely insecure. I am calling upon your government to assist in ending the desperate situation of the KCTF members. GS Caltex needs to come to a fair and honest agreement with its workers and end its unfair labour practices. Also, the dismissed union leaders must be reinstated. 
 
Thanking you in advance for your kind cooperation 
 
 
Yours sincerely, 
 
 
(Name) 
(Title) 
(Union)

Model protest letter to Korean government

Meeting in Istanbul on 6 and 7 April, delegates at the ICEM’s 3rd World Conference for the Rubber Industries ended two days of discussions and information exchange on Friday with the adoption of a plan for action. 
<img height="120" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ICEMrubber.JPG" width="120"/>
Topics at the conference included current world-wide trends in the rubber industries, one of the most oligopolistic industrial sectors, and their effect on workers, as well as the need for multinational companies to guarantee respect for national and international workers’ rights. The conference was attended by over 100 representatives from 16 ICEM affiliated rubber sector trade unions from 14 countries. 
 
At the conference, two special resolutions were adopted. The first one dealt with the recently announced Goodyear plant closures in the UK and Poland, declaring international solidarity support towards the Goodyear workers in those countries. 
<img height="213" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0604rubberconfparticipants.jpg" width="390"/>
The second resolution calls on Goodyear, Bridgestone and Pirelli to “exert common sense and to bargain in good faith” with Turkey’s ICEM affiliate Lastik-Iş. These three companies take a very harsh approach to collective bargaining in Turkey. They are not only demanding concessions in working conditions, they have also consistently called on the Turkish government to ban strikes, while simultaneously threatening to leave the country. 
 
The conference adopted an action plan for the next four years, setting out broad guidelines for international trade union action at both national and international level. An important priority in the action plan is the need for continued and improved dialogue with multinational companies in the rubber sector, including through global framework agreements and global trade union networks. Special emphasis also goes to health and safety issues. 
Other priority areas are the difficulties related to the increased use of contract and agency labour and the fight for gender equality. 
 
Leo Gerard, International President of ICEM’s US affiliate USW (United Steelworkers), was re-elected as Chair of the ICEM rubber section. 
 
Speaking at the conclusion of the conference, ICEM general secretary Fred Higgs said that “The discussions, resolutions and adoption of a forward looking action plan by the conference demonstrates that unions around the world in the rubber sector are determined to meet the challenges of a rapidly changing industry on the basis of mutual support and solidarity”. 
 
 

For the resolution on the Goodyear plant closings in the UK and Poland, <a href="/index.php?id=164&doc=1754&la=EN" type="internal">click here</a>. 
 
For the resolution on collective bargaining in Turkey, <a href="/index.php?id=164&doc=1750&la=EN" type="internal">click here</a>. 
For more information on this conference, including background documents and presentations, <a href="/index.php?id=164&la=EN" type="internal">click here</a>.

ICEM’s World Rubber Conference Reacts to the Challenges of Globalisation

<img height="287" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0603rubberconflogo.jpg" width="200"/>
ICEM World Conference for the Rubber Industries 
6-7 April 2006 
Istanbul, Turkey 
The day before the opening of the ICEM World Conference for the Rubber Industry in Istanbul, US-based tyre company Goodyear Tire & Rubber announced its intention to close two European plants. Goodyear Dunlop is to end production at its Washington factory in Tyne and Wear, UK, with the loss of 585 jobs. A further 39 jobs could be lost in another company’s plant in Wolverhampton, UK, which is a supplier of components to the Washington factory. 
 
Goodyear will also stop the production of bicycle tyres in its Polish factory in Debica with the loss of 320 jobs. 
 
Together with planned savings from other business units, Goodyear expects to cut a total of 1,500 jobs. 
 
The delegates at the ICEM world conference expressed serious concern about this plan. They fully support their sister trade unions in the UK and in Poland in their fight for the workplaces of their members. 
 
For a big multinational company like Goodyear, the use constant use of redundancies to try to cut costs is a very poor sign. A challenging market needs investment and R&D activities, instead of plant closures all over the world. 
 
The ICEM and its affiliated trade unions strongly urge the management of Goodyear to show social responsibility and help the workers in both plants getting the chance to save the future of their families.

ICEM Rubber Conference Resolution - Support for the Workers Struggle in 2 European Goodyear plants

In the latest example of the appaling series of human and trade union rights violations in Colombia, the ICEM has learned of the murder of brother Daniel Cortez Cortez, a member of ICEM’s Colombian affiliate Sintraelecol. 
<img height="66" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Colombiaflag.gif" width="100"/>
On Sunday April 2nd, brother Cortez was murdered in Puerto Parra, near the city of Barrancabermeja, the third largest city in Colombia, in a region known to be controlled by the paramilitaries. For the last 16 years, he has been working for the energy company Empresa Electrificadora de Santander, where he had been an active trade union member from the day he started. 
 
Daniel Cortez was assassinated at night on April 2nd. Attacked by a group of paramilitaries, he died instantly when he was shot in the face. He leaves behind a wife and four children and the ICEM offers its sincere condolences to his family, colleagues and friends. 
 
In a <a href="/index.php?id=26&doc=1756&la=EN" type="internal">letter to the Colombian authorities</a>, the ICEM calls for an urgent, full and open investigation into the exact circumstances of this brutal assassination. Those responsible for the crime need to be brought to justice and convicted. 
 
The murder is, regrettably, not a stand alone case. Far more trade unionists are murdered in Colombia every year then anywhere else in the world. According to preliminary figures, over 70 murders on trade unionists were counted last year. In 2004, there were at least 99. 
 
“This murder can not be just another addition to an already lengthy list. We need to keep realising that every time a trade unionist is killed in Colombia, a new tragedy unfolds. Each time, new families, other colleagues and different communities are faced with the loss of a family member, a colleague or a friend” said Fred Higgs, General Secretary of the ICEM. “It is imperative that we continue our demands on the Colombian government for effective protection for trade unionists in Colombia.”

Member of Sintraelecol, ICEM Affiliate in Colombia, murdered

To: All ICEM affiliates in Nepal 
 
Brussels, 12 April 2006 
 
Dear friends and colleagues, 
 
Ever since the illegitimate takeover of power by King Gyanendra in February 2005, the ICEM has been closely following the courageous efforts of its affiliated trade unions and others in Nepal. We are proud to have been able to support you and other trade unions as you have staged and taken part in the many demonstrations and protests actions against the king’s autocratic rule. 
 
As we follow the unfolding events of the present time, we look in disbelief at how the so-called government in Nepal clings on to power using a wide range of brutal measures which seem to be installed specifically to hurt its own people. 
 
The ICEM strongly protests against the many arrests in Nepal that have taken place over the last few days, including the many arrests of both ordinary trade union members as well as trade union leaders. We also condemn the increasing violence used against the people of Nepal. We forcefully support the actions of the independent trade unions in Nepal as part of the broader struggle for the restoration of democracy. 
 
In name of the 20 million members of the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions from 122 countries, I would like you to congratulate you on your actions so far and let you know that we are firmly with you and the Nepalese people in your united struggle against the royal oppression during this strike and beyond. 
 
In Solidarity! 
 
Fred Higgs 
General Secretary

ICEM letter of support for Nepalese affiliates

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