Sweatshop
Victory in the Marianas Islands as posted on Co-op America
Great news: For
more than a decade Co-op America and our members have been working together to
end sweatshops, human trafficking, and exploitation on the Commonwealth of the
Northern Mariana Islands, a US Territory in the Western Pacific.
On April 10, 2008 the US
Senate voted 91-4 to finally extend federal labor and immigration laws to the
Mariana Islands. The House has already passed the Bill and it will be
signed into law. (For background on this issue, please see our previous
editorials here and here.)
This is a long-delayed
victory to end some of the worse labor abuse in the world. In 1992 the owners
of sweatshops on the main island of Saipan were fined $9.2 million for labor
violations. In 2004 a high-profile 1999 lawsuit against 27 US name-brand
retailers and 23 Saipan garment factories was finally settled for $20 million.
Over the years,
Congressional hearings and dozens of reports from human rights workers, NGOs
and the US Government detailed an economic system in the Mariana Islands based
on exploitation and abuse. For years it was clear that federal control of
labor, immigration and custom laws was required to shut down the system of
abuse. And yet, since 1995 every effort to pass legislation to place the
Marianas Islands fully under US laws and oversight was killed by lobbyists like
Jack Abramoff and his Congressional allies.
This obstacle to justice
has finally been removed. Human rights advocates and the workers are
celebrating (you can join them at their Web site, Unheard No More).
To learn more about
sweatshops and how to take action, download our latest Guide to Ending
Sweatshops online.
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