Please see attached, Issue 72 of Asian Labour Update.

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Asia Monitor Resource Centre invites applications for Program Coordinator - closing date February 2010.

Time is Ripe! Universal and Comprehensive Social Security for All Asian Peoples Asia has been badly hit by the global financial crisis since October 2008. Such hits are far more frequent than we would like to believe. Greater are the impacts on Asia given that more than two thirds of Asian workers are informal and they lack a well-functioning comprehensive social security system.

Our undersigned organizations and social movements stand for the rights of women workers as women, as workers, and as human beings with the right to live and work in dignity.

OPEN LETTER TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF KOREA FROM THE ATNC NETWORK

To
The President
The Republic of Korea

Stop Violence against Ssangyong Workers

The Asian Transnational Corporation Monitoring Network (ATNC), a network of more than 37 organizations, trade unions and social movements across Asia, condemns the brutal police action on the workers at the Ssangyong factory. We stand in solidarity with the workers and their struggle.

The Asian Transnational Corporation Monitoring Network (ATNC) strongly condemns the closure of the Triumph International Philippines factory inside the FTI Complex in Taguig City and the nearby Star Performance Incorporated as well, as the layoff of nearly 50% of the workforce in the Body Fashion Thailand (BFT), Triumph International's Thai subsidiary.

The ground reality

Philippines:

Union leaders and members from NagaWorld casino and hotel workers union have been dismissed unlawfully, and the company refuses to engage in meaningful negotation. The company is irresponsible - laying off fairly elected union leaders while reaping millions of USD in profit! The stockholders met in Hong Kong, and supporters of NagaWorld union, like HKCTU and AMRC, joined in demanding meeting time, to no avail. Demand union rights be upheld! View the documents and lend your support.

NagaWorld Employees, dismissed for union activities! Please support fellow workers. (Attached flyer in English and in Chinese.)

The Asian Asbestos Congress 2009 (AAC) was organised jointly by the Asia Monitor Resource Centre (AMRC), International Ban Asbestos Secretariat (IBAS), Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions (HKCTU) and the Association for the Rights of Industrial Accident Victims (ARIAV) and supported by the Ban Asbestos Network Japan (BANJAN), Ban Asbestos Network Korea (BANKO), Building and Woodworkers International (BWI), International Metalworkers Federation (IMF) and the Asian Network for the Rights of Occupational Accident Victims (ANROAV).

Expansion of TNCs in Asia and Implications for Labour

The construction industry is the single biggest non-agricultural industry in the capitalist world. More than 70% of the 111 million workers employed worldwide are in developing countries. With the two biggest countries China and India, Asia accounts for more than half of the global construction workforce.