Press Release
8 August 2009

Reference Person

Merly Grafe

SCW Chairperson

+630968898274 (mobile); 046-8840076 (landline)

Braving the stormy weather, workers from Cavite forwarded a protest letter addressed to President Lee Myung-bak and picketed in the Korean Embassy yesterday, August 7, demanding justice for the workers of Ssangyong Motors Branch in Korea who were brutally attacked by state authorities amidst their 77-day sit-in strike.

Though the workers’ strike in Ssangyong Motors Branch ended in the same day of the protest action of Caviteño workers, calls of justice to free all arrested Korean activists still continue according to Ms. Merly Grafe, Solidarity of Cavite Workers (SCW) Chairperson.

“As a matter of fact, we were not surprised of the Ssangyong Motors management’s actions to lay off its workers in the thick of the current global economic downturn. What caught us in complete dismay was the state authorities’ brutal, almost deadly, response to the demand of workers for jobs security,” Ms. Grafe stressed out.

She further elaborated, “It’s very disheartening to learn and see that our co-workers in Korea were attacked violently and inhumanely. And these happened in very sharp contrast with the boasts that South Korea plans to become the heart of human rights in Asia. Likewise, it is very disturbing to know that the ‘deadly’ dispersal happened under the term of the current Korean United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon.”

“SCW will continue to call justice for the workers and activists of the Korean Metal Workers Union (KMWU) consistent to our unwavering condemnation of the persistent and violent campaign of the Arroyo Administration against the workers’ actions to advance our legitimate and democratic rights,” Ms. Grafe’s determined assertion.