Trade Commission Orders Duties on Paper Imports
The Obama administration today continued to support American workers by deciding to apply tariffs to subsidized and dumped coated paper imports from China and Indonesia.
The unanimous vote by the U.S. International Trade Commission (USITC) clears the way for the U.S. Department of Commerce to immediately impose antidumping and countervailing duties on imports of coated paper from these countries.
United Steelworkers (USW) President Leo Gerard said the vote was a “strong confirmation” of the injuries suffered by American paper makers and workers.
Trade laws between nations must be enforced with government fact finding and the power to defend jobs and industries with strong tariff penalties for import violations.
91 Unionists Killed in 2008, 49 in Colombia Alone
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A total of 91 union members were killed worldwide last year, the same number as in 2007. But more than half (49) were killed in Colombia alone, 10 more than last year, making it once again the most dangerous country for trade unionists, according to the International Trade Union Confederation’s (ITUC‘s) “Annual Survey of Violations of Trade Union Rights.”
The Colombian government has not vigorously investigated or prosecuted the killing of trade union members. At the current pace of investigations and trials, it would take 37 years to prosecute the backlog of cases. And the caseload is growing—the rate of killings, which had fallen for a few years, jumped sharply last year by 25 percent, says José Luciano Sanin, director of Escuela Nacional Sindical (National Union School), a leading Colombian think tank.
Global Support Growing for Employee Free Choice
Since Friday, when we wrote about international union support for the Employee Free Choice Act, more letters backing this critical legislation have poured in from around the world.
In separate letters to United Steelworkers (USW) President Leo Gerard, leaders of unions in eight countries, along with an international union federation, have expressed solid support for the bill. The latest letters come from all corners of the world: Paraguay, Japan, Ghana, Argentina, Brazil, Indonesia, Thailand and Togo, the base of the 13-member International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions (ICEM).
Workers Around the World Back Employee Free Choice
Workers around the world understand the freedom to freely join a union is a human right and one of the key marks of a free society. That’s why the global union movement is solidly behind the Employee Free Choice Act.
The most recent examples of that strong support come from Thailand and Indonesia. In a letter to United Steelworkers (USW) President Leo Gerard, Saman Pronprachathum, general secretary of the Petroleum & Chemical Worker’s Federation of Thailand, says “a strong economy depends on workers [being] given the opportunity to join a trade union and to bargain collectively so that fair wages and social benefits are lifted for all in a society.”
