México - Korean Mining company tries to incite worker violence

The Korean owners and/or managers of El Boleo Mine in Baja California Sur attempted to pit miners against each other in order to bring in the police and dislodge miners engaged in a work stoppage. The company handed picks and crowbars to a group of workers and told them to attack those engaged in the work stoppage, with the goal of justifying a police intervention.

The mine has “unjustifiably fired some 200 workers” to keep them from affiliating with the SNTMMRM. A group of miners protested at the Korean embassy, telling the Korean government’s representatives that El Boleo mine was violating labor rights protected in the Mexican Constitution and in labor law. They said the company had not only violated the law, by attempting to provoke violence among the miners, but refused to allow them to elect their union representatives and failed to protect the miners’ health and safety. They accused the mine’s manager, Eduardo Linares G. of “sexual harassment” of the miners. The manager required all miner’s to sign a blank sheet of paper upon hiring, giving management the ability to present false statements signed by the miners.

© ITUC-CSI-IGB 2013 | www.ituc-csi.org | Contact Design by Pixeleyes.be - maps: jVectorMap