U.S. complicit in labor abuse

[54anickel]

http://www.argusleader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070530/COLUMNISTS0209/705300302/1119/COLUMNISTS

Factory by factory, the report by the National Labor Committee documents a hellhole of abusive labor practices in the Mideast country of Jordan.

At Al Shahaed Apparel & Textile, which made clothes for Wal-Mart and Kmart, workers routinely were forced to work 38-, 48- and even 72-hour shifts. They were paid the equivalent of 2 cents per hour. At the Western Factory, which made clothes for Wal-Mart, Kohl's and the Gap, work was seven days a week with mandatory shifts lasting 16 to 20 hours. Workers who fell asleep from exhaustion were hit with rulers until awake. (The Gap and Kmart deny any connection to these factories. But Charles Kernaghan of the National Labor Committee says illegal subcontracting occurs without the knowledge of retailers.)

The facts contained in the committee's 2006 report (www.nlcnet.org) are a brutal indictment of American companies' complicity - whether knowing or not - in a system of abuse and exploitation of workers abroad. The mostly Bangladeshi, Chinese, Indian and Sri Lankan work force was brought to Jordan to churn out duty-free goods for America's biggest retailers. The workers - some only 14 or 15 years old - were barely fed, stuffed into overcrowded dorms without running water and regularly cheated of their already paltry wages.

I bring this up because the U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement, which was signed in 2000 and implemented by President Bush, was lauded as the first trade pact that contained labor and environmental protections in the body of the agreement. Jordan agreed to enforce its own labor laws and those core rights contained in the conventions of the International Labor Organization (ILO), which are: the right to organize and bargain collectively and prohibitions on compulsory labor, child labor and employment discrimination.

These protections, as well as the most basic human rights, were ignored. It took the release of the National Labor Committee's blockbuster report before conditions improved.

This example is why I approach the "historic" deal struck between congressional Democrats and the Bush administration on future trade deals with a dose of skepticism. Earlier this month, it was announced with great fanfare that labor and environmental standards would be added to pending free trade agreements with Peru, Panama, Colombia and South Korea.

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