Human Rights

Many Thai migrant workers look forward to coming home after years of hard lives overseas, but not everyone finds a happy ending. Read More

As editor of the San Jose-based Farsi monthly Pezhvak, Shahbaz Taheri says he strives to be a bridge between Iranian immigrants and American society. Now he fears he helped deliver some of his readers to jail. Read More

At least 700,000 people are trafficked worldwide each year; trafficking is the fastest growing means by which people are enslaved today. Young girls are trafficked to work as domestics in West Africa, boys as young as four are abducted from countries in South Asia and forced to work as camel jockeys in the Gulf, and women from eastern Europe are sold into Europe's sex industry. Read More

Internet sites containing the words "democracy", "Tibet" and "Taiwan" are among those most frequently blocked by the Chinese government, a study of Chinese net access has revealed Read More

The United Nations Committee on Economic, Cultural and Social Rights issued a statement Wednesday declaring access to water a human right and stating that water is a social and cultural good, not merely an economic commodity. Read More

LONDON (November 12, 2002) -- Victims of Shell Oil environmental abuses in the South Africa and the United States will attempt at 11 a.m. on November 12th at Shell Centre, The Cut, Waterloo, near London to deliver a message to Shell Oil company officials about their readiness to negotiate on facility site issues. Also at Shell's world headquarters, the victims will attempt to deliver to top company officials copies of a new book, ''Riding the Dragon: Royal Dutch Shell & The Fossil Fire.'' Read More

A lawsuit filed Tuesday in the New York District Court demands reparations from 20 banks and corporations that supplied critical support to the apartheid regime that ruled South Africa until 1994. Read More

Kenneth Clarke, former chancellor and deputy chairman of British American Tobacco, faces severe embarrassment today over revelations that he criticised companies investing in Burma -- where BAT has a joint venture with the military junta. Read More

Why are American corporations, which have labored hard to present positive global images, providing censorship and surveillance technologies to what many see as China's Big Brother Internet? The short answer: money. Building China's Internet means making lots of it, and companies that want access to this new market often must give the Chinese leadership what it demands. Read More

BRUSSELS (October 28 2002) -- On 28 October, on behalf of the Global Unions Group, the ICFTU is releasing a new database of over 325 foreign companies with business links to Burma -- links that help to sustain the brutal and repressive dictatorship in that country. While some prominent companies have withdrawn since the initial release of the database one year ago, Global Unions have added a further 92 companies which continue to do business with Burma or have been pursuing business links with the junta. Read More