On the picket line
By
Sue Davis
Published Mar 16, 2005 1:17 PM
Longshore workers to shut ports March 19
Members of International
Longshore & Warehouse Union Local 10 will honor the International Day of
Protest Against the U.S. War and Occupation in Iraq on March 19 by not moving
any cargo in Bay Area ports.
Instead the ILWU Drill Team will lead the
labor continent in the San Francisco protest under the slogan,
“Don’t starve our communities to feed the war
machine.”
A labor contingent is also being organized for the March
19 protest in New York City.
Cingular strike averted
Threatening to
strike proved decisive in winning a decent contract for 5,300 Cingular Wireless
workers. On March 7 the Communications Workers announced an agreement with an
11-percent pay increase over four years and strengthened job security. The
latter was a huge issue given Cingular’s recent buyout of AT&T
Wireless.
SF Labor Council defends Venezuela
The San Francisco
Labor Council raised a fist for international labor solidarity at its Feb. 28
delegates meeting. It unanimously passed a resolution opposing “the
complaint initiated by the Venezuelan employers association, FEDECAMARAS, before
the ILO [International Labor Organization meeting in Geneva on March 16]
recommending a Commission of Inquiry into trade union freedoms in Venezuela.
This Complaint has been endorsed and supported by employers’ associations
in 23 countries, including the United States.
“It is our view that
the convening of an ILO Commission of Inquiry is designed to undermine the very
progress of the labor movement within present-day Venezuela.”
The
9-million-member Unified Workers Confederation of Brazil issued a similar
statement in February.
The resolution also called upon the California
Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, to follow up on its resolution passed last summer
opposing funding by the national AFL-CIO supporting U.S. government policy in
Venezuela.
The SFLC resolution noted, “Opposition to the ILO
Commission of Inquiry on Venezuela by the U.S. labor movement is part of the
same struggle to promote a new foreign policy by labor that is independent from
U.S. State Department objectives.”
Articles copyright 1995-2012 Workers World.
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