Successful Day of International Solidarity Day in Uruguay

As part of the Days of Action for Mexico, IndustriALL, together with UNI Americas and affiliated unions, including the Uruguayan national metalworkers’ union UNTMRA  (Unión Nacional de Trabajadores Metalúrgicos y Ramas Afines),  the bank workers union AEBU (Asociación de Empleados Bancarios del Uruguay) and the Southern Cone Trade Union Centrals Coordinating Committee, the CCSCS (Coordinadora de Centrales Sindicales del Cono Sur), led a demonstration outside the Mexican embassy in Montevideo. A large group of workers held banners with slogans such as: “No to Protection Contracts in Mexico, Yes, to Recovery of the Bodies from Pasta de Conchos”  and  “International Solidarity with Trade Union Autonomy in Mexico”.

Sixty-five candles were lit outside the embassy to simbolize the deaths caused by employer negligence on 18 February 2006. Seven years after the Pasta de Conchos mining disaster, there are still calls for the Mexican government to show some sensitivity on this issue.

Jorge Almeida, IndustriALL Regional Secretary, Carlos Martínez, UNTMRA International Relations Secretary,  Adriana Rosenzvaig,  UNI Americas Regional Secretary, Fernando Gambera, AEBU General Secretary  and Marcelo Abdala, PITCNT coordinator and UNTMRA General Secretary all made speeches after delivering a letter to the President of Mexico in the presence of a hundred workers beating drums and waving banners.

The speakers denounced the abuses to which Mexican workers are subjected, criticised the employers’ anti-trade union practices and expressed Uruguayan workers’ solidarity towards the just struggle of the Colombian trade union movement.

Jorge Almeida thanked the representatives from sister organisations for attending and reiterated his call for the Mexican government to stop the systematic violation of trade union rights, end all forms of anti-trade union pressure against the National Miners’ Union and other independent unions, comply with workers’ basic human and labour rights and ensure justice for the families of the victims of the Pasta de Conchos disaster.