Advance notice to press: County Cork Lusitania anniversary conference to welcome Maritime Labour Convention to Ireland

Please find this advance notice attached and below. A full press release will also be sent just ahead of the event.

Yours,

Sam Dawson

24 April 2015. Advance notice to press

County Cork Lusitania anniversary conference to welcome Maritime Labour Convention to Ireland

For your diary: On the occasion of the Lusitania sinking centenary, the International Transport Workers' Federation (ITF) and Siptu (Services, Industrial, Professional and Technical Union) will hold a one day conference at the National Maritime College of Ireland (www.nmci.ie), County Cork, on Wednesday 6 May.

 

The ground-breaking Maritime Labour Convention is commonly described as the seafarers' bill of rights. It comes into operation in Ireland this year. The conference will investigate the experience of countries that adopted it earlier, and how the lessons they learnt can be used to remedy some of the scandalous treatment of ships' crews visiting Irish ports and workers on vessels fishing in Irish waters.

 

Journalists are invited to attend the event, which takes place from 09:00 to 17:00, after which attendees will travel out to sea to lay a wreath in memory of those who died on the Lusitania.

 

ENDS

 

If you would like to attend please drop a line to Ken Fleming, ITF UK and Ireland coordinator. Email: fleming_ken@itf.org.uk

 

ITF communications: getting the message out - when and where it matters

www.itfglobal.org 

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Twitter: @itfglobalunion

This email is confidential and may be privileged. If you have received it in error, please notify the sender and then delete it immediately. You should not copy it or use it for any purpose nor disclose its contents to any other person. Any views or opinions expressed within the email are solely those of the sender and do not necessarily represent those of the ITF.

Press release: World trade unions hold tuna giant to account at Belgian expo

Please find this release, along with accompanying photos, attached and below.

Yours,

Sam Dawson

ITF

23 April 2015

World trade unions hold tuna giant to account at Belgian expo

Global union federations the IUF and ITF, assisted by Belgian trade unions, yesterday used the Brussels Seafood Expo to spotlight human rights abuses by Philippines' tuna giant Citra Mina.

 

Unions demonstrated outside the venue to expose the deplorable conditions and abuses at the Citra Mina Group, one of the Philippines' largest tuna exporters.

 

The event (www.seafoodexpo.com), held from 21 to 23 April, is the world's largest seafood trade fair, where the Citra Mina Group's Philfresh Corporation was one of the 1,700 companies exhibiting and seeking contracts with buyers.

 

Citra Mina stands accused of multiple offences. Most recently, ongoing hearings in the Philippines' House of Representatives have chronicled a systematic pattern of rights abuses by the group's companies, including serious violations of labour standards and trade union rights, the use of shell companies to evade legal obligations, the slave-like conditions on boats, and deaths on the high seas.

 

The ITF (International Transport Workers' Federation) and IUF (International Union of Food, Agricultural and Hospitality Workers) were joined by Belgian unions CSC Alimentation et Services, FGTB Horval, and CSC Transcom to support unfairly dismissed Citra Mina Group workers in the leading Philippines tuna centre of General Santos. There 70 workers were sacked for starting a legal union (see http://goo.gl/wdXHGu).

 

Ahead of yesterday's action a joint trade union delegation also met with representatives of the European Commission and raised the matter of the Citra Mina workers' struggle.

 

Ron Oswald, IUF general secretary, commented: "The tenacious struggle for their rights by these workers and their families and many supporters has resonated throughout the Philippines and beyond."

 

Liz Blackshaw, programme leader for the joint ITF/IUF Catcher to Counter programme, said: "This demonstration was just one action by which we are delivering a clear message to the buyers and company representatives. The Expo came directly after the European Tuna Conference, which claims to promote sustainable tuna fisheries. But there can be no sustainable fisheries without social sustainability and compliance with international human rights and labour standards.

 

"Pressure is needed by all industry actors and by governments to ensure compliance by abusive companies in order to raise standards for the sector as a whole. The illegal conduct and blatant abuses by Citra Mina are jeopardising this vitally important effort."

 

ENDS

 

Attachments

Photos of yestereday's protest. More photos can be downloaded gratis from https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.357569181103289.1073741829.240399139486961&type=1

 

For more details please contact

IUF communications and publications editor. Tel: +41-22-793 22 33. Email: peter.rossman@iuf.org

ITF press and editorial manager Sam Dawson. Tel: +44 (0)20 7940 9260. Email: dawson_sam@itf.org.uk

 

 

 

ITF communications: getting the message out - when and where it matters

www.itfglobal.org 

www.facebook.com/ITFglobal 

Twitter: @itfglobalunion

This email is confidential and may be privileged. If you have received it in error, please notify the sender and then delete it immediately. You should not copy it or use it for any purpose nor disclose its contents to any other person. Any views or opinions expressed within the email are solely those of the sender and do not necessarily represent those of the ITF.

Press statement: ITF expresses condolences over Antwerp docker deaths

Please find a brief statement attached and below.

Yours,

Sam Dawson

ITF

15 April 2015

ITF expresses condolences over Antwerp docker deaths

The ITF (International Transport Workers' Federation) has expressed its condolences to the families and colleagues of three experienced dockworkers who died on Saturday in Antwerp, Belgium, after entering a ship's hold to unload coal.

 

ITF president and chair of its dockers' section, Paddy Crumlin, said: "Our thoughts are with the families, their colleagues and friends of these three men. This must be a desperately sad time for them.

 

"We can never relax on port safety and accident prevention. Antwerp is a port where health and safety is taken very seriously, and, like the three men's trade unions, we are confident that a full investigation will take place into what happened and how any resulting lessons can be implemented."

 

He concluded: "Dock work is dangerous work and everyone involved must always do everything possible to minimise the risks. This is a timely reminder of the importance of Workers' Memorial Day on 28 April (28april.org), whose message is 'Remember the dead, fight like hell for the living'."

 

ENDS

 

ITF communications: getting the message out - when and where it matters

www.itfglobal.org 

www.facebook.com/ITFglobal 

Twitter: @itfglobalunion

This email is confidential and may be privileged. If you have received it in error, please notify the sender and then delete it immediately. You should not copy it or use it for any purpose nor disclose its contents to any other person. Any views or opinions expressed within the email are solely those of the sender and do not necessarily represent those of the ITF.

Press release: Unions from LAN Airlines and TAM Airlines from seven countries expand support for striking

Please find attached and below a press release from the ITF LATAM network.

Yrs,

Sam Dawson

ITF

14 April 2015

Seventy-five union leaders meet in Santiago, Chile

 

Unions from LAN Airlines and TAM Airlines from seven countries expand support for striking LAN Airlines workers

 

·      Union leaders representing mechanics, pilots, flight attendants, and ground staff of LAN Airlines and TAM Airlines from seven countries: Chile, Peru, Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil and Paraguay are providing support to the striking workers of LAN in Chile. 

 

·      The union leaders are announcing the escalation and expansion of the conflict throughout the region. 

 

More than 75 union leaders from the LATAM Group in Chile, Peru, Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil and Paraguay are meeting in Chile in order to expand the conflict to each one of these countries.

 

LAN Airlines is owned by the LATAM Group, the largest passenger and airline cargo company in Latin America, a result of the merger of LAN Airlines and TAM Airlines.  The company continues to operate under these two major brands.

 

The union leaders meeting in Santiago represent more than 50,000 workers in the LATAM Group and are unanimous in denouncing the anti-worker practices and the multiple conflicts with aviation workers throughout the region.  These conflicts include the strike in Chile, and the anti-union dismissal of the president of the Ecuadorian aviation union, Jimena Lopez.

 

The LAN and TAM Airline union leaders are meeting with the striking workers in Chile in order to expand and escalate the conflict and to expose the anti-union policies of the largest passenger and cargo airline company in Latin America.

 

At Santiago airport passengers were absent from the LAN check-in counters during a demonstration on Saturday by striking LAN workers and their families.

 

LATAM is a full member of the One World Alliance. The group has bilateral agreements with American Airlines, Iberia, Qantas, Lufthansa, All Nippon Airways, Cathay Pacific, Japan Airlines, Air Canada and Aero México.

 

The union leaders meeting in Santiago, Chile are members of the LATAM Network of Unions and affiliates of the International Federation of Transport Workers (ITF) representing 4.5 million transport workers in the world, in around 700 unions in some 15o countries.

 

 

 

For more information:

 

Luis Chávez Garrido, President,  Union of Lan Express Workers /Federation of LAN Workers Tel. 56 9 68320444.  www.sindilanex.cl / Facebook / @LanNego

 

Eric Arce, Secretary, Union of LAN Express Workers Tel.  +56968343016

 

Nancy Arancibia Olivares, periodista Red LATAM

Nancynaao@gmail.com.  Tel. +56 9 97434611 Skype: nancy_arancibia

 

Dina Feller, coordinadora de la RED LATAM ITF

Tel: +54 911 63030725. Email: redlatam.itf@gmail.com

 

www.organizatelatam.com

Facebook: Red-Latam-ITF -  Twitter: @LATAMNETWORKITF

 

 

 

Santiago Airport, Saturday, April 11, 2015

 

 

 

ITF communications: getting the message out - when and where it matters

www.itfglobal.org 

www.facebook.com/ITFglobal 

Twitter: @itfglobalunion

This email is confidential and may be privileged. If you have received it in error, please notify the sender and then delete it immediately. You should not copy it or use it for any purpose nor disclose its contents to any other person. Any views or opinions expressed within the email are solely those of the sender and do not necessarily represent those of the ITF.