22 June, 2011The government of Sri Lanka withdrew a new Employee Pension Benefit Fund Bill on June 3 after massive protests. One worker was killed and hundreds injured during workers' strikes on May 31. IMF condemns the attack on workers and supports ITUC's call for solidarity.
5 July, 2011The Australian Workers' Union (AWU) won a definitive judgment from Fair Work Australia on 24 June that grants the union right of entry to lunch rooms at Rio Tinto's Alcan aluminium smelter in Bell Bay, Tasmania. The ruling ends months of legal wrangling and should serve as a precedent against employers from blocking legitimate union access to workers on job sites.
5 July, 2011General Electric (GE) workers in America ratified a four-year labour agreement in late June that now sets a pattern for 15,200 unionised GE workers in the US.
4 July, 2011About 170,000 workers, the vast majority of whom are members of the National Union of Metal Workers of South Africa (NUMSA) embarked on a nationwide strike in the engineering sector on 4 July after a deadlock in wage negotiations. The strike action which brought Johannesburg to a standstill, was also carried out in other major cities nation wide.
25 June, 2011During his visit to the National Assembly of Korea as part of a numerous delegation of trade unions and progressive political parties IMF Assistant General Secretary, Fernando Lopes reported about increasing workers' rights abuses in Korea.
24 June, 2011In a landmark court ruling, cancer among workers in the semiconductor industry is considered for the first time to be an occupational disease.
24 June, 2011For the first time, a delegation of IMF affiliated unions visits the Paris Air Show, emphasizing the importance of labour in the success of the industry.
16 June, 2011For almost 40 days the workers of Paraná, Brazil, were on strike demanding better pay through profit sharing.
15 June, 2011On June 9 and 10, the EMF held it's fourth congress in Duisburg, Germany and celebrated 40 years. The Congress elected new leadership, took another step towards the creation of a European Industrial Trade Union Federation and set out the political agenda for the next four years.
