ILWU Files Labor Rights Complaint Against Costa Rica

[Omaha Steve]

http://blog.aflcio.org/2010/08/06/ilwu-files-labor-rights-complaint-against-costa-rica/

Jennifer Sargent, communications director of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union’s (ILWU) Coast Longshore Division, reports on the union’s complaint against Costa Rica under the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA).

The ILWU hopes a recent announcement that the U.S. Department of Labor is responding to a trade complaint against Guatemala for labor violations bodes well for its own recent filing of a complaint against Costa Rica.


Costa Rican police took over the SINTRAJAP union hall in May.

On July 20, the ILWU Coast Longshore Division charged Costa Rica with “serious and repeated failures by the government of Costa Rica to effectively enforce its own labor laws” in an 18-page complaint with the Department of Labor’s Office of labor and Trade Affairs (OTLA). Less than a week after the ILWU’s filing, the Department of Labor took steps to initiate its first ever case under DR-CAFTA against a trade partner for labor rights violations by responding to a petition the AFL-CIO filed against Guatemala in 2008 DR-CAFTA.

“We hope that the announcement that the United States government wants Guatemala to take specific and effective action to curb labor rights violations is just the first of many steps that the Obama administration will take to pursue the failure to enforce labor laws among trade partners,” said ILWU President Robert McEllrath.

The AFL-CIO’s petition to the Department of Labor sat for more than two years without action. The ILWU’s petition against Costa Rica should be dealt with swiftly and decisively, in order to protect workers from further abuse, and to stop the systematic elimination of the labor organizations that protect them.

The ILWU’s recent complaint was filed in conjunction with two Costa Rican unions: the Sindicato de Trabajadores de JAPDEVA (SINTRAJAP) and Asociación Nacional de Empleados Públicos y Privados (ANEP).

You can download a copy of ILWU’s complaint here: http://www.longshoreshippingnews.com/2010/07/ilwu-files-cafta-complaint-against-the-costa-rican-government/07-20-10-ilwu-sintrajap-anep-dr-cafta-complaint-to-otla-concerning-the-government-of-costa-ricas-failure-to-follow-its-labor-laws-under-the-ilo/

FULL story at link.