Columbia - Family of Coke worker machine gunned

Family of Coke worker machine gunned

A Colombian death squad struck at the family of a Coca-Cola union leader, killing two and wounding three kids.

21.04.2004 (By Maria Engqvist, ANNCOL) At 7 am on April 20, various armed men with machine guns entered the home of the brother of Coca-Cola union leader Efrain Guerrero's wife in Bucaramanga, and fired indiscriminately at the family.

Guerrerro's brother-in-law, Gabriel Remolina was shot dead together with his wife Fanny and three of their children were wounded. One of these children, Robinson Remolina, is in grave condition in the hospital.

Shortly before the killings, lawyers contracted by the Coke workers had announced that they had filed a case against Coca-Cola in the United States, for acts of anti-union violence in Colombia.

President of Sinaltrainal, (the National Food Industry Workers Union) Luis Javier Correa said that this is not the first time that the families of union leaders have been the victims of such violence.

"This happened in the context of the labor conflict against Coca Cola, where we are trying to avoid the firing of workers due to closing production lines," Correa said.

A group of 91 workers-nearly three-fourths union leaders-was dismissed in February after Coca-Cola closed several plants. After a union-led hunger strike in March, Coke agreed to negotiate a transfer of the union members slated for layoff.

During the protest, group affiliated with the country's most notorious paramilitaries, the army-backed AUC, released a statement declaring war on the union leaders and promising to "finish them all off" if they do not leave the country in three months.

"We also just had a meeting with the Vice President of the Coca-Cola bottlers where we expressed our concern for the security problems," Correa said.

Kidnapped the son of a unionist

Paramilitaries acting with at least tacit approval of Colombian Coca-Cola officials are suspected in the murder of seven Coca-Cola unionists in recent years and the kidnapping and torture of others. About 3,600 Colombian union members have been killed in the last two decades, at the hands of right-wing paramilitaries and security forces.

In December 2003 paramilitaries arrived at the home of Sinaltrainal union leader Rafael Carvajal in Cúcuta and threatened that they would assassinate his family if he did not turn down his complaints against the soft drink giant, who had unjustly suspended him from his work contract several times.

On the same day the son of national Sinaltrainal President Javier Correa was kidnapped in Bucaramanga, but was later released.

source: http://www.anncol.org