Labor Alerts: a free service of Campaign for Labor Rights To subscribe or unsubscribe, write to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. Web site: <www.summersault.com/~agj/clr> Phone: (541) 344-5410 Fax: (541) 431-0523 Membership/newsletter: Send $35.00 to Campaign for Labor Rights, 1247 "E" Street SE, Washington, DC 20003. Sample newsletter available on request. GUATEMALAN UNION LEADER'S FAMILY RECEIVES DEATH THREAT WHILE SHE VISITS NEW YORK TO PROTEST PVH PRACTICES posted June 21, 1999 See ACTION REQUEST at end of this alert. Husband of PVH Union Leader Receives Death Threat [The following information was provided on June 17 by the U.S./Labor Education in the Americas Project (formerly the U.S./Guatemala Labor Education Project): (773) 262-6502, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; and on June 19 by the global Sweatshop Coalition (in New York City): (212) 645-5230, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>.] The day after Phillips-Van Heusen Guatemalan union leader Marisol Lopez delivered a stinging report on the company's operations in Guatemala, her husband Mario Naves reported that he had received a death threat phone call. Lopez's husband received a call on June 16 from a man who said that he had been contracted to kill the Lopez family in Guatemala. The caller, who refused to identify himself, told Mr. Naves that he and the PVH workers camped in front of PVH's closed factory should cease their activities immediately or they would all end up dead. PVH closed the factory in mid-December, claiming a need to cut production. The report charges instead that PVH closed the factory, the only one in the maquiladora sector with a union contract, in order to concentrate production at contractors who pay half or less what PVH paid its workers. Workers interviewed at the contractors also reported extensive labor law violations. Mr. Naves has filed a complaint with the Guatemalan Public Ministry and with the UN agency monitoring implementation of the peace accords, MINUGUA. The call came the same day that the U.S./Labor Education in the Americas Project (US/LEAP) filed a petition with the office of the U.S. Trade Representative asking for a review of Guatemala's duty-free trade benefits, provided under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) trade program, because of worker rights violations in Guatemala. The petition focused extensively on violations in Guatemala's maquiladora sector as revealed in the expose on PVH contracting operations in Guatemala. No one is accusing PVH of having orchestrated death threats, but others have a vested interest in keeping unions out Guatemala's maquiladora sector. And GSP petitions have usually been received with hostility by the business sector. On June 15, Marisol Lopez met with Klatsky in New York to deliver an exhaustive and scathing report charging that PVH shifted its production to non-union Guatemalan sweatshops after shutting down the CAMOSA plant. López was accompanied by representatives of UNITE, the US apparel workers union and the People of Faith Network. Klatsky denied Lopez' request to address the company's annual stockholder meeting on June 17. Instead, López made her statement outside the stockholder meeting at a demonstration of about 75 supporters, inviting Klatsky "to come to Guatemala and interview for himself the workers whose testimonies are the basis of this report.... We think he will agree with us that this terrible mistake should be corrected immediately by reopening CAMOSA." The demonstration was sponsored by the Global Sweatshop Coalition, which also organized a street theater action at PVH outlets on June 12 and sponsors regular Wednesday leafleting outside PVH corporate headquarters on Madison Avenue. Participants in the June 17 protest included members of Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees (HERE) Local 100, Laborers Local 78, the People of Faith Network, UNITE's Stop Sweatshop Campaign, UNITE Local 169 and the UNITE Garment Workers Justice Center. The protest was dominated by a giant, 30-foot inflatable rat which Local 78 set up on the sidewalk outside the shareholder meeting. Part of the action was the presentation of the Global Sweatshop Coalition's Golden Rat award to Klatsky as unionbuster of the year. The demonstrators also passed out some 2,000 educational fliers in English and Spanish. <><><><><> ACTION REQUEST Please copy, sign and send the following letter to PVH CEO Bruce Klatsky and please send the signature portion of your letter (not this whole alert!) to Campaign for Labor Rights: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> or fax: (541) 431-0523. If you wish to contact Phillips-Van Heusen by telephone, the number is (212) 381-3501. Bruce J. Klatsky, CEO Phillips-Van Heusen 200 Madison Avenue New York, NY 10016 Fax: (212) 381-3500 Dear Mr. Klatsky: The day after Phillips-Van Heusen Guatemalan union leader Marisol Lopez delivered a report to you of the company's operations in Guatemala, her husband Mario Naves reported that he had received a death threat phone call. The caller, who refused to identify himself, called Mr. Naves on June 16 and told him that he and the PVH workers camped in front of PVH's closed factory should cease their activities immediately or they would all end up dead. The call came the same the day that the U.S./Labor Education in the Americas Project (US/LEAP) filed a petition with the office of the U.S. Trade Representative asking for a review of Guatemala's duty-free trade benefits, provided under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) trade program, because of worker rights violations in Guatemala. The petition focused extensively on violations in Guatemala's maquiladora sector as revealed in the report delivered to you by Marisol Lopez on PVH contracting operations in Guatemala. No one is accusing Phillips-Van Heusen of having orchestrated death threats, but it is undeniable that your company profits from an atmosphere of intimidation against labor leaders and other human rights advocates in Guatemala. Many in Guatemala and elsewhere in the world had hopes that the contract resulting from collective bargaining with the union at PVH's CAMOSAS factory heralded the beginning of labor relations without such intimidation in Guatemala's production-for-export sector. However, by closing CAMOSAS and by shifting that production to low-wage, anti-union sweatshops in Guatemala, you and your company demonstrated that you value profits above consideration of reprisals and repression against workers. I call upon Phillips-Van Heusen to provide evidence that it is committed to worker rights and ending sweatshop abuses. I urge you to reopen the CAMOSAS factory, either under its own management or with a new business partner, rehire the workers, recognize the union and accept a collective bargaining agreement. I also urge you to contact the U.S. embassy in Guatemala and contact the maquiladora sector to express your personal concern about death threats being issued against Phillips-Van Heusen workers and their families. Sincerely, NAME: ADDRESS:
