Complaint to the International Labour Organization

The punitive action against ITUA activists in Tver, as well as many other instances of persecution and discrimination against union members in Russia, have forced the All-Russian Confederation of Labour, the national union organization which includes the ITUA, to submit a complaint to the International Labour Organization. The violations reported in it are grouped into the following categories:

1. The right to life, security, physical and moral personal integrity;
2. The right to found organizations without prior authorization;
3. Violation of trade unions' rights by state authorities;
4. Discrimination against workers for being union members;
5. Violation of trade unions' rights by employers; and
6. Failure by law enforcement agencies to ensure the protection of trade unions' rights.

The complaint documents a series of violations in Russia. For example, in 2008 two attacks were carried out on Alexei Etmanov, chairman of the local union at the Ford plant in Vsevolozhsk and one of the leaders of the ITUA. The first time three unknown persons tried to beat him up, but he managed to escape and began firing on them with a non-lethal weapon. The attackers fled. The next day the vice-chairman of the Ford local, Vladimir Lesik, received a telephone call from an unknown man who openly stated that the previous day's attack was a punishment for Etmanov's union activity.

The second time, an unknown person tried to attack Etmanov in his own apartment building, by lying in wait for him near the elevator. Etmanov again managed to escape, and a policeman even detained the attacker in hot pursuit, but after initial interrogation the latter disappeared.

Those guilty of these cowardly attacks have never been found or punished.

2008 also saw the beatings of Sergei Bryzgalov and Aleksei Gramm, ITUA local activists at the TagAZ plant in Taganrog.

The government has been doing everything in its power to obstruct or delay the registration of industrial and regional unions. For example, the registration procedure for the ITUA took seven months. In July 2009 the authorities refused to register the Inter-Regional Organization of the Union of Commercial and Service Workers of Saint Petersburg and Leningrad Oblast. That refusal to register has been appealed, but a decision on the appeal has still not been issued.

Government agencies systematically interfere in the activity of the unions. The situation involving intimidation of ITUA activists in Tver is quite typical. Events at Ford in Vsevolozhsk have followed the same scenario. In addition, Kozhnev and Etmanov have been intimidated by the FSB, and the chairman of the local at the GM Auto plant in Saint Petersburg, Evgeni Ivanov, was directly approached by officials of the E Center who tried to get him to "cooperate", that is to become an informer.

Of course, hostility on the part of employers toward unions is just as common as intimidation by the authorities. For example, the management of the GM Autovaz plant in Togliatti simply ignores the ITUA local. Despite the fact that management has been notified of the establishment of the local, it does not interact with the union in any way, does not answer its letters and declares to government inspection agencies that there are no unions at its enterprises. It has not been possible to prove the illegality of management's acts in court.

Discrimination against workers due to their union membership is ubiquitous. At the auto assembly giant AutoVAZ in Togliatti there is an ITUA local whose members are subject to constant pressure by management: they are deprived of overtime work, transferred to hardship departments, refused permission to take unpaid leave (and that during the crisis, when the plant was working at half capacity), and they are subjected to intimidation. Despite numerous complaints, the procurator's office has done nothing to defend the workers against discrimination.

The various forms of pressure include restricting access of union activists to workplaces (AutoVAZ, GM Autovaz), unjustified prohibition against taking part in collective bargaining (AutoVAZ), and dismissal (Tsentrosvarmash, GM Autovaz, TagAZ and others).

The facts set forth in the complaint concern only a few unions, but they clearly reflect the extent of the pressure being exerted against worker activists and their organizations in the Russian Federation. The situation is critical: if it gives up active work, the still young and weak independent labour movement in Russia may be crushed within a few years.

Not only activists of relatively small unions such as ITUA, but also members of large national unions fall victim to persecution. Recent examples include the local branch of the Miners & Metallurgical Workers' Union of Russia (MMWU), an IMF affiliate, at "Alexandrinskaya Ore Mining Company" in Chelyabinsk. The local branch has been under pressure for months. Management employed all-too-familiar methods: dismissals, intimidation of union members, manipulating the wages. The deputy chair of the union committee Natalya Kniazkova was dismissed twice. Both times she was reinstated upon court orders.

The management of the plant promised to implement a wage rise of 10 per cent in January 2010, however in February the so-called coefficient of work participation was introduced. That's when the union members were threatened that they "won't get a dime". However those who decide to leave the union were promised a sum of money equivalent to two or three months' wages.