News on Violence Against Trade Unionists in Colombia

The Obama Administration has begun to push more aggressively to revive the Free Trade agenda of the Bush and Clinton Administrations, initiating negotiations for a new Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with nations bordering the Pacific Ocean and saying it will push for a vote on three pending FTAs negotiated by the Bush Administration, including Colombia.   The Administration is expected to

USLEAP joined labor, environmental, human rights, development and faith-based organizations in submitting written comments to the United States Trade Representative (USTR) in response to a formal request to the public for opinions  on labor-related issues in the context of the pending Free Trade Agreement with Colombia.  In their comments, these groups outlined the specific human righ

The Colombian government’s chief intelligence and security service has once again been implicated in illegal activity against trade unionists and human rights leaders. 

According to an annual survey released on June 10 by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), Colombia not only led the world in number of trade unionists murdered but accounted for nearly 65% of all assassinations of unionists worldwide in 2008.

A wrongful death lawsuit has been filed against Dole Food Co. on behalf of 73 people, victims of murdered trade unionists and farmers in the banana-growing region of north Colombia, accusing the company of funding paramilitaries to carry out assassinations and terror tactics in order to protect its banana operations.

Eight labor and human rights organizations, including USLEAP, issued a joint statement on March 5, 2009 calling on the Colombian government to respect the work of trade unionists and human rights defenders in Colombia and to retract new statements that put these workers at risk. 

On February 20, 2009, two U.S. senators sent a letter to Colombian Ambassador Carolina Barco addressing the recent remarks made by President Uribe during a public assembly against human rights advocates

Despite a heavy last minute push by the Bush Administration, the Colombian government, and editorial boards across the country, in addition to hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on lobbyists,

On Monday, USLEAP delivered a report to Congress that shows inconsistency among judges hearing anti-union violence cases, a confused process for motive assignment, and almost no progress against

Last year, Colombia once more led the world in the number of trade unionists murdered, according to a survey released November 20, 2008 by the Brussels-based International Trade Union Confederati