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Dear Mr. President, 
 
On behalf of 45 million industrial workers represented by the International Metalworkers&rsquo; Federation (IMF) and the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM) we are writing to you to express our serious concern with the situation in Mangystau Province, Kazakhstan. 
 
We have been informed that oil workers of Karazahnbasmunaigaz had to work in harmful conditions. After numerous attempts to settle the issue with the employers with no results oil workers decided to go on strike in May 2011 demanding the employer to improve working conditions and pay additional compensation for the work in bad conditions. Workers of Uzenmunaigaz and other operations in the region joined the strike later on. Unfortunately instead of engaging in good faith negotiations with the workers the employers recurred to tactics of pressure. This led to the aggravation of the social situation in the region. 
 
To our knowledge, the oil workers&rsquo; strike resulted in numerous acts of repression. 
 
On August 8 Natalia Sokolova, a union lawyer, was sentenced to six year imprisonment for alleged offence of &ldquo;inciting social hatred&rdquo;. During her one week trial, the judge allowed neither testimonies of defense, nor evidence by independent experts. 
 
A number of other workers and activists involved in the strike were also accused of participation in illegal protests and spent some time in prison and/or were ordered to pay substantial fines. Hundreds of workers were fired. 
 
On July 8 and 10 workers&rsquo; rally in Aktau was stormed by riot police. The participants of the rally were violently beaten. 
 
The situation in the region was aggravated by a number of horrendous murders. 
 
On August 2 Zhalsylyk Turbaev, 28-year old drill operator and a union activist, was murdered right at his workplace, his skull was broken. 
 
On August 24 Zhansaule Karabalaeva, 18-year old daughter of the president of the union committee at Uzenmunaigaz, was found dead on the outskirts of Zhanaosen. She received multiple knife wounds; her skull was broken, her jaw was crushed. 
 
Oil workers and their family members are frequently beaten by thugs. Every day workers also receive death threats. 
 
Mr. President, we believe that human rights issues are one of your central concerns. In 2010 Kazakhstan took the presidency in the OSCE. At the OSCE summit in Kazakhstan, Astana Commemorative Declaration was adopted, once again reinstating the commitment of OSCE members to human rights. In the word and spirit of this declaration, as well as the Constitution of Kazakhstan and international standards, we urge you to start immediate investigation of the facts of persecution and violence in Mangystau province, and take all the necessary measures to stop the suffering of the workers. 
 
Yours faithfully, 
 
 
Manfred Warda, ICEM General Secretary 
Jyrki Raina, IMF General Secretary

ICEM-IMF Letter to Nursultan Nazarbaev, President of Republic of Kazakhstan

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The International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and &amp; General Workers&rsquo; Unions (ICEM) condemns the cold-blooded assassination of a Colombian contract worker who was working with affiliate Uni&oacute;n Sindical Obrera (USO) to bring trade union rights to temporary workers at Ecopetrol&rsquo;s Barrancabermeja refining and petrochemicals complex in Santander department. 
 
Isidro Rivera Barrera, 45, was repairing a washing machine in front of his home at 16h on 26 September in Barrancabermeja when a gunman jumped off a motorcycle and shot him three times at point-blank range. The assassin and accomplice then escaped on the high-powered motorcycle. 
 
&ldquo;This cowardly act again reminds us that Colombia is a deadly country for those exercising freedom of association and free speech rights,&rdquo; said ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda. &ldquo;We reiterate our trade union affiliate USO&rsquo;s call that Colombia&rsquo;s public prosecution office uses all means to apprehend and prosecute the criminals and masterminds behind this heinous crime.&rdquo; 
 
The ICEM also called on Ecopetrol, its major contractor at Barrancabermeja, Foster Wheeler AG, and all other sub-contractors to ensure the security of all oil industry workers in the city. The ICEM further called on 90% state-owned Ecopetrol and its contractors to create workplace climates where freedom of association and rights to join unions and bargain collectively are considered common civil liberties. 
 
Isidro Rivera was shot twice in the shoulder and once in the throat. He died within minutes of the shooting, slumped across the chair he was working on and in front of neighbours who came running after hearing the shots. Isidro Rivera was a recognised union member by Ecopetrol who was attempting to spread the trade union message to contract workers inside Colombia&rsquo;s biggest downstream oil and petrochemical facilities. He is survived by three children. 
 
For further information, contact ICEM Information Officer Dick Blin, <a href="mailto:dick.blin@icem.org">dick.blin@icem.org</a>, +41 22 304 1842.

Contract Workers’ Leader at Ecopetrol in Colombia Assassinated

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Some 300 members of Australia&rsquo;s Construction, Forestry, Mine and Energy Union (CFMEU) are locked in a fierce battle with the American door and window-maker Jeld-Wen. Woodworkers of the CFMEU&rsquo;s Forestry, Furnishing and Timber Building Products Division have been on strike &ndash; and locked out five days &ndash; at factories in four Australian states. 
 
The central issue is pay. CFMEU has been negotiating with Jeld-Wen subsidiaries Corinthian, William Russell Doors, and Stegbar since June over a new enterprise agreement, but the meagre wage increases offered over a three-year proposal would mean actual pay cuts for workers. In recent talks, the company reshuffled its pay offer but it still fell far short of Australia&rsquo;s 4.5% cost-of-living rise. 
 
Workers at six factories &ndash; including St. Mary&rsquo;s near Sydney, New South Wales; Dandenong, Cambellfield and Scoresby in Victoria; Regency Park near Adelaide, South Australia; and Canningvale, Perth, Western Australia &ndash; took 48-hour strike actions on 6 September. They then were hit by the five-day lockout on 8 September. Workers immediately undertook further and varying strike actions over the last two weeks at the six worksites. 
<img src="" width="242" height="161" alt="" />
Photo: The Western Weekender
Global labour leaders attending the CFMEU&rsquo;s National Construction Conference in Canberra recently visited the St Mary&rsquo;s picket line on 16 September, and the Building and Wood Workers&rsquo; International (BWI) has picked up the cause and is actively supporting CFMEU members. BWI has launched a protest campaign through its website. Please join that protest <a href="http://www.bwint.org/default.asp?Index=3685&amp;Language=EN">here</a>.&nbsp; 
 
CFMEU National lead Negotiator Phil Davies said the revised pay offer given after the company&rsquo;s lockout ended on 13 September is worse than Jeld-Wen&rsquo;s original &ldquo;non-negotiable&rdquo; pay proposal. If accepted, one-third of all job classifications would actually see a further decline in real wages compared to inflation. &ldquo;All our members want is fair and reasonable pay and conditions,&rdquo; he said. 
 
The company is seeking to abolish an attendance-based bonus scheme as well. Meanwhile, the employer has sent letters to workers warning of future lockouts. 
 
Family-run and closely-held Jeld-Wen, started in 1960 by Richard Wendt, purchased the Corinthian factories in Australia and Asia on the cheap during the Asian financial crisis in the mid-1990s, and in 1999 bought Stegbar from a UK-based company. In North America, Oregon-based Jeld-Wen overextended itself in recent years with diversification into ski resorts and holiday properties at the exact time housing and real estate markets crashed. 
 
Next month, Canadian private equity company Onex is expected to close on a US$860 million infusion into Jeld-Wen, giving it 58% ownership of a company that operates 60 manufacturing and distribution sites in 22 countries. The deceased Wendt&rsquo;s son, Roderick, will cease heading one of the world&rsquo;s biggest door- and window-makers in exchange for an Onex selectee.

US Firm Slams Door on CFMEU Members Trying to Catch Inflation

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Three European industrial trade union federations are on track now for delivering greater strength and power to workers in greater Europe. The European Mine, Chemicals, Energy Federation (EMCEF), the European Metalworkers&rsquo; Federation (EMF), and the European Trade Union Federation &ndash; Textiles, Clothing and Leather (ETUF-TCL) have adopted a strict timeline in order to conduct dissolution congresses and a founding congress on 15-16 May 2012 in Brussels. 
 
A joint working group is expected to finalise statutes at a meeting on 8 November and that will be followed by discussion and ratification by the federations&rsquo; respective governing bodies in late November and early December. An initial joint executive committee meeting of EMCEF, EMF, and ETUF-TCL will then be held in Brussels on 30-31 January 2012. 
Also in the weeks and months prior to the May 2012 creation of a single European industrial federation, four joint political committees will begin charting the future structure of the organisation. Those political areas are Industrial Policy, Corporate or Company Policy, Social Dialogue, and Collective Bargaining. Future work in the yet-to-be-named federation will happen under those headings. 
 
Like integration on the global level between Global Union Federations, the European creation strives to reach workers&rsquo; hands across supply chains to make sustainable jobs the bulwark of future economies. The general secretaries of the three federations that are driving this are Michael Wolters (EMCEF), Ulrich Eckelmann (EMF), and Luc Triangle (ETUF-TCL).

EMCEF, EMF, ETUF-TCL Integration to Occur in May 2012 in Brussels

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The European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) held its first mass mobilisation since a new team took over the 82-member confederation last spring. The 17 September march and manifestation in Wroclaw, Poland, against austerity platforms delivered the obvious: jobs and wages are not the enemy of the economy, but the engine. 
 
Some 40,000 trade unionists, representing national labour centres across Europe, manifested in the southwestern Polish city to meet head on the two-day meeting of the Economic and Financial Affairs Council (ECOFIN). They demanded that austerity measures not be part of any revamped European financial integration. 
 
While Member State economic and finance ministers were in Poland to craft greater monetary discipline in crisis-time Europe, unionists and their leaders said better economic governance must come in improved employment opportunities and higher social standards. 
<img alt="" src="" width="241" height="160" />
The ETUC condemned the European Central Bank, the Commission, and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for pressuring Member States &ldquo;to adopt an overambitious pace of fiscal consolidation, to deregulate job and social protection systems, to weaken and decentralise wage formation and collective bargaining systems.&rdquo; 
 
ETUC General Secretary Bernadette S&eacute;gol said, &ldquo;We&rsquo;re here to tell our politicians that they shouldn&rsquo;t be sawing through the branch they are sitting on.&rdquo; She said salary cuts and social benefit reductions do not lead to growth and do not reduce debt. 
 
&ldquo;We believe there are other options,&rdquo; said S&eacute;gol, &ldquo;such as European (finance) obligations, taxing financial transactions, ending tax havens and tax evasion&rdquo; and implementing a fair system of taxation. (See the <a href="http://www.etuc.org/a/9013 ">ETUC statement to ECOFIN</a> here.) 
<img alt="" src="" width="243" height="160" />
The Wroclaw manifestation was held jointly with ETUC&rsquo;s two Polish national labour centres, Solidarność and the All Poland Alliance of Trade Unions (OPZZ). The colourful march started at Olympic Stadium and passed in front of Centennial Hall conference centre &ndash; venue for ECOFIN &ndash; before ending up in Wroclaw&rsquo;s old city. Throughout, the chants of jobs, workers&rsquo; rights, social rights, and solidarity were heard. 
 
ETUC President Ignacio Fern&aacute;ndez Toxo, the President of CC.OO of Spain, said neoliberal financial ideology has proven to be a failure and warned that current austerity agendas will not solve the crisis but only deepen it. ETUC Deputy General Secretary Jozef Niemiec, a former engineer from Krakow, Poland, and stalwart of NSZZ Solidarność, reiterated those comments, stating austerity measures &ldquo;will only worsen the current economic and social situation.&rdquo; 
 
The ETUC rally was attended by trade unionists from Spain, Germany, Portugal, Italy, Norway, Sweden, Hungary, Lithuania, and Slovenia, with the largest delegation hailing from Poland, which currently holds the presidency of Europe.&nbsp;

Economic Growth Through Jobs, ETUC Tells Euro Finance Ministers

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On 18-20 June 2012, a new Global Union Federation (GUF) will see daylight at a founding congress in Copenhagen, Denmark. 
 
But what shall the new International be called? Now you have the chance to make a proposal. 
 
The organization will unite 50 million workers in more than 140 countries in mining, energy, metal, electronics, chemicals, paper, rubber, materials, garments, shoe, leather textile industries. 
 
It aims to connect workers, fight for labour rights and build global solidarity across entire supply chains. It will be a strong counterweight to multinational companies and promote social justice, democracy and a sustainable future for the whole world. 
 
Such a powerful organization needs a fresh and identifiable name. Your contribution is welcome. Please send your proposal by e-mail to <a href="mailto:imf.icem.itglwf@gmail.com">imf.icem.itglwf@gmail.com</a> at the latest by 31 October 2011. 
 
A joint Executive Committee meeting of the IMF, ICEM, and ITGLWF will decide upon a name at the end of February 2012.

What Name for New GUF? Suggest It!

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Three trade union leaders at Euroasian Steels in Kutaisi, Georgia, will be released from jail late this week after serving ten-day administrative arrests. Emilo Gumberidze, Irakli Iobidze, and Malkhaz Gogiava were rounded up in a marketplace in Kutaisi eight days ago, three days after <a href="/en/4-Chemicals-Pharmaceuticals/4667-ICEM-Scorns-Blatant-Police-Repression-in-Putting-Down-Georgian-Metal-Strike">Georgian police brutally broke a strike</a> there by ICEM affiliate Metallurgical, Mining and Chemical Industry Workers&rsquo; Trade Union of Georgia. 
 
The three were charged with narcotics possession/consumption and given drug tests. All three plainly passed. But in expressing the ridiculousness of the charge, the three were cited with disrespecting police. On 19 September, the Kutaisi City Court sentenced Gumberidze, Iobidze, and Gogiava to ten days in jail. 
<img alt="" src="" width="240" height="160" />
The sentence was a ruse to lock up trade unionists who are leading a legitimate workers&rsquo; movement decrying a two-year-old worksite that has no wage structures, no plan on safety and health, no adherence to global labour standards, no overtime pay, but limitless and mandatory work at low pay. When workers exercised their global right to strike under such conditions, they were met by a police crackdown reminiscent of a police state. Twenty-nine steelworkers at Euroasian, or known locally as Hercules, have been fired in recent weeks for exerting their voice over the horrid and despicable working conditions. 
 
Euroasian Steels is an Indian-Georgian enterprise, 87.5% owned by Manaksia Ltd.&rsquo;s Euroasian Ventures, and 12.5% by Paata Chkhenkeli, a Georgian construction engineer who has close ties with a government eager for business but void of labour or regulatory statutes. Hercules is a mini-mill that rolls rebar and steel billet from molten iron scrap and then sells the steel bar to central Asia&rsquo;s construction industry. 
<img alt="" src="" width="275" height="160" />
Georgian police brutally break strike: 15 September 
Photo: RIA Novosti 
It employs 400 workers, including 130 Indian nationals who are segregated from the Georgian workers and who themselves are treated like indentured servants. Their passports are held by management, their salaries sent back to India, and they are given a small stipend to live on. On 21 September &ndash; separate from the Metallurgical, Mining, Chemical Workers&rsquo; Union&rsquo;s clash &ndash; Indian workers went on a two-hour work stoppage to protest their dire conditions. It was their second strike in recent months. 
 
The situation at Euoasian Steels in Kutaisi is gaining widespread attention, which cannot be good for the Georgian business climate or the country&rsquo;s social record. The ICEM sent a sharp letter of protest to Georgia President Mikheil Saakasvhili and Prime Minister Nika Gilauri on 19 September over the previous week&rsquo;s blatant human rights abuses by police and government authorities. (An <a href="/en/77-All-ICEM-News-Releases/4668-ICEM-Condemns-Georgia-Police-in-Suppressing-Union-Rights-at-Euroasian-Steels">ICEM news release</a> is here.)&nbsp; 
 
LabourStart has started a new <a href="http://www.labourstart.org/cgi-bin/solidarityforever/show_campaign.cgi?c=1101">Georgia campaign</a> on the most recent repression and can be found here.&nbsp;And several protest actions by the Georgian Trade Unions Confederation (GTUC), NGO, and others in Georgian civil society were held last week at government ministries in Tbilisi and provincial offices in Kutaisi. These will continue this week, culminating in a mass action at Georgia&rsquo;s parliament on 1 October.

Georgian Trade Union Leaders Jailed for Passing Drug Test

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Government-mediated talks broke off last week and labour relations further soured between Freeport-McMoRan and 8,000 striking Indonesian miners of ICEM affiliate FSP-KEP (SPSI), the Trade Union of Chemical, Energy, and Mine Workers (CEMWU). The PT Freeport Indonesia Workers&rsquo; Union of CEMWU this week meets the halfway mark of its 30-day strike that now could be prolonged at the world&rsquo;s largest gold and third largest copper mining complex &ndash; Freeport McMoRan&rsquo;s Grasberg mine in eastern Papua Province, New Guinea Island. 
 
Management spite was apparent at the strike&rsquo;s start on 15 September and it worsened following the breakdown of three days of talks with the Manpower Ministry in Jakarta on 22 September. PT Freeport managers relieved 138 union shop stewards of their job duties on Friday. The union responded by stating the strike likely will be extended beyond 15 October. 
<img alt="" src="" width="252" height="160" />
Since the wage, pension, and community funds strike started, managers have coerced workers to return to work with threats of dismissal, they have pressed contractors&rsquo; employees into production, and now they try to decimate the union by sacking union stewards and isolating the branch union&rsquo;s other leaders. 
 
PT Freeport management has attempted to coerce workers to sign a statement saying they will return to work or face getting fired. But despite this, only 500 workers are manning operations and many are staff of contractors. (See a <a href="/wp-content/migration/icem/1109.indo%20contractors.docx ">list of contractors</a> here.) 
 
Freeport-McMoRan last week issued a statement last week saying it was losing three million pounds of copper production daily, and 5,000 ounces of lost gold output daily. To increase pressure on miners to abandon the strike, the company also warned of lost revenues to the Indonesian government and to the seven native groups around Timika, Papua, that Freeport-McMoRan is obliged to support. 
 
The opening salvo came at the strike&rsquo;s outset when Managing Director Armando Mahler announced a &ldquo;no-work, no-pay&rdquo; policy. After last week&rsquo;s mediation failure, union and government sources said &ldquo;complete distrust&rdquo; exists between Mahler and his team and the union. 
 
Thus, PT Freeport Indonesia Workers&rsquo; Union asked that US-based Freeport-McMoRan Chairman James Moffett enter discussions. Mine union leaders remember Moffett&rsquo;s visit a few years ago when he encouraged workplace leaders to engage in &ldquo;win-win&rdquo; principles of labour relations. 
<img alt="" src="" width="250" height="159" />
At last week&rsquo;s mediation, PT Freeport, 91% owned by Freeport-McMoRan and 9% by Indonesia&rsquo;s government, said it would not budge from a wage offer of 11% in each year of a two-year accord. (The bi-annual contract comes due on 1 October.) The average miner&rsquo;s wage rate at Grasberg is US$1.50-per-hour. The union was seeking a doubling of that to US$3-an-hour but in mediation last week, the FSP-KEP miners&rsquo; branch union offered a compromise and proposed a 65% increase. The company would not move from 11%. 
 
It has offered slight increases in education and housing support and in shift pay, but has said it would not deviate from wage increments that other foreign investors pay in Indonesia. It also refuses to base a pension scheme &ndash; 50% paid into by workers &ndash; on multiplied years of service, or hear the union&rsquo;s demands for enhanced development and opportunities for the indigenous people of Papua. 
 
Grasberg is Freeport-McMoRan&rsquo;s biggest revenue maker and a year ago, the company&rsquo;s chief financial officer called it &ldquo;very low cost and a high cash flow generating asset with a very long life.&rdquo; The company&rsquo;s revenues this year from Grasberg are expected to be lower because it is mining lower-grade sections of the open pit mine. But Freeport-McMoRan is bullish on the future; it is developing a deep underground mine adjacent to Grasberg that contains high grades of copper and gold in the same ore body. 
 
The ICEM has intervened in this dispute and through its Indonesian Affiliates&rsquo; Union Chairman, D. Patombong Sjaiful of FSP-KEP, is giving direct aid and support to the Grasberg strikers. They need the solidarity and support of all miners and all trade unions in mining and other industrial sectors. Please send a short message in your own words to the <a href="mailto:Puk.fsp.kep.spsi.ptfi@yahoo.com; 2391936@gmail.com; Sudiro_930haulage@yahoo.com; pp.fspkep_spsi@yahoo.co.id; parorronganjuli@gmail.com; me2union@yahoo.co.id">PT Freeport Indonesia Workers&rsquo; Union</a>. 
 
In ICEM outreach to the union, when asked to characterise the strike, one officer responded by saying, &ldquo;determination. That&rsquo;s the one word that describes workers. We&rsquo;re determined to change our future through the work we do for this company.&rdquo;

PT Freeport Mine Managers Turn Rabid on Indonesian Grasberg Strikers

<img src="" width="100" height="39" alt="" />
The three-month-long wage dispute between a branch of ICEM Indonesia affiliate Federasi Serikat Pekerja Pulp Dan Kertas (FSP2KI) and managers of a pulp mill on Sumatra Island owned by the Japanese Marubeni Group was resolved recently. Along with settlement, the Human Resource director that exhibited rude and coercive behaviour toward the union&rsquo;s bargaining committee in July was sacked. 
 
SPPTTEL, the branch union of FSP2KI at the PT Tanjung Enim Lestari pulp mill near Muaraenim, and Marubeni were able to reach a 2011 wage accord with help from the provincial Manpower Ministry office. The two sides reached a compromise on wages, but it was the company&rsquo;s dismissal of Eko Ganefianto that perhaps is the biggest triumph for paperworkers of SPPTEL. 
 
In collective negotiations, this boss threatened worker layoffs and termination of all bargaining committee members when the union put forward its wage demands. Ganefianto also threatened to call out police to forcefully break any strike that SPPTTEL called. 
 
Mostly due to the manager&rsquo;s words and tone, SPPTTEL did strike for three days in late July (see <a href="/en/19-Pulp-Paper/4573-Paperworkers-Strike-Indonesian-Pulp-Mill-Pressure-Brings-Marubeni-to-Table ">prior ICEM report</a>). Although a police presence was nearby, the walkout by 1,000 paperworkers was peaceful. 
 
In pursuant bargaining, the union retreated from monthly wage demands of IDR 632,000 (US$74) and the company moved upward considerably. The agreement reached just over two weeks ago calls for a monthly increase of IDR 240,000 (US$27) per month. The average median salary at Marubeni&rsquo;s pulp mill is IDR 2 million, or US$235-per-month. 
 
The union also won payment for the three days of strike action, and partial payment on salaries for the post-fasting Ramadan days of Eid ul-Fitr.

Indonesia Pulp Dispute Settled; Human Resource Director Sacked

<img alt="" src="" width="100" height="39" />
The European Mine, Chemicals, Energy Federation (EMCEF), the European Chemical Employers&rsquo; Group (ECEG), and the European Chemical Industry Council (Cefic) signed on 6 September a declaration to jointly encourage policymakers to implement the recommendations by the High Level Group on the Competitiveness of the European Chemical Industry. 
 
The agreement was signed at the European Commission headquarters in Brussels with Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion Commissioner L&aacute;szl&oacute; Andor participating. 
 
The three-pillared blueprint, entitled &ldquo;Framework conditions for a sustainable chemical industry in Europe,&rdquo; centers on positive environmental, economic, and social principles. Under the environmental principal, the three social partners share the view that the voluntary Responsible Care programme offers the best possibilities to make continual improvements in safety, health and the environment. 
<img alt="" src="" width="134" height="160" />
Bottom, Cefic President Giorgio Squinzi and Commissioner L&aacute;szl&oacute; Andor; top, ECEG&rsquo;s Jean Pelin, EMCEF&rsquo;s Michael Wolters and representative from German chemical employers&rsquo; grouping, BAVC
The social component specifies good working conditions, life-long learning, and improving employability through skill development, retention and re-employment. The social partners also emphasize opportunities here for young people, and they say this social framework serves so far as the main contribution to the Agenda for New Skills and Jobs under the Euro 2020 strategy. 
 
The economic pillar is built around competitiveness and innovation, and striving to maintain Europe&rsquo;s strong position in global chemicals. The declaration states that the High Level Group&rsquo;s recommendations do &ldquo;form a strategic agenda for areas such as innovation, intellectual property, regulation, energy and climate change, logistics and trade policy.&rdquo; 
 
EMCEF General Secretary Michael Wolters said the declaration &ldquo;highlights the urgent need to see sustainability as a way to safeguard and expand high-skilled, high value-added jobs in Europe through a comprehensive EU industrial policy.&rdquo;

Europe’s Chemical Social Partners Sign Sustainability Pact

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