Fresenius Medical Care AG

ILO violation 87 : Some 300 workers, 98 per cent of whom were women, went on strike at the Antalya FTZ plant of the German company Fresenius Medical Care in the Antalya export processing zone on 26 September in the first ever strike in a Turkish export processing zone. The strike was called by Petrol-Is some 18 months after the union had succesfully organised the workers. For a full year, the company had refused to recognise the union. When it finally did, it started collective bargaining talks with the union on 19 April, but ostentatiously refused to come to an agreement. Prior to the creation of the union, working conditions had been so bad that women were forced to apply to the company for permission to marry, and talking on the job was forbidden. These conditions had improved somewhat after the union had organised the facility, but management had continued harassment of union members, openly pressuring them to resign from it. In order to break the strike, the company went as far as to hire some 60 scab employees, which is forbidden even by the current Turkish Law no. 2822. The strike was still going on at the time of writing.: Turkey

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