They might end up as costly baubles on sale in shops around the world. But for some diamonds mined in Zimbabwe, the journey begins in massive illegal pit mines where men, women, and children are forced to work long days under the brutal authority of government troops, who took over the mine in a spree of bloodshed.
An alarming number of girls working as domestics in Indonesia, some as young as 11, face physical and sexual abuse as well as gross labor exploitation.
Today, many companies say that they should treat workers well and address their impact on human rights wherever they operate, but not all follow through. What are some of the key issues for foreign and domestic companies in India and for Indian companies operating abroad, as India emerges as an economic power?
The United States, famous as a nation of immigrants, should also be infamous for its bouts of anti-immigrant sentiment. Often our intolerance has been fueled by national-security fears. At other times, Americans have made misguided assumptions about who immigrants are and the rights that protect them.
When trade negotiators and street protestors in Miami this week debate the impact of a Free Trade Area of the Americas on workers throughout the region, they should consider its precursor, the North American Free Trade Agreement, as a cautionary tale.
The Bush administration is quietly carrying on a major new trade negotiation with Central America that could show -- contrary to the notion that globalization hurts workers -- how international trade deals can increase respect for labor rights. But the Bush team must get the right formula into its briefing books.
Caste-based discrimination is at the heart of bonded labor. Nallanayaki, like the vast majority of bonded laborers, is a dalit, a so-called untouchable, on the lowest rung of India's caste system. Across India, dalits are segregated from their upper-caste counterparts, denied access to land, forced to work in degrading conditions, and expected to perform free labor.
As riot police shut down workers' protests in northeast China, Beijing's diplomats in Geneva have little to worry about. As things now stand, they won't be forced to defend China's treatment of labor organizers, or its crackdown on pro-democracy activists, Tibetans or Internet users. Nor will there be any debate on China's human rights record at the annual meeting of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights now underway in Geneva -- unless the European Union, the U.S. and other key governments act quickly to push for a resolution on the issue.
At Human Rights Watch's invitation, Dr. Maya Soetoro-Ng writes on the situation of child domestic workers in Indonesia.
They might end up as costly baubles on sale in shops around the world. But for some diamonds mined in Zimbabwe, the journey begins in massive illegal pit mines where men, women, and children are forced to work long days under the brutal authority of government troops, who took over the mine in a spree of bloodshed.
What does this weekend's Domestic Workers' Day mean to the approximately 700,000 Indonesian children who toil in these jobs? Absolutely nothing.
An alarming number of girls working as domestics in Indonesia, some as young as 11, face physical and sexual abuse as well as gross labor exploitation.
Today, many companies say that they should treat workers well and address their impact on human rights wherever they operate, but not all follow through. What are some of the key issues for foreign and domestic companies in India and for Indian companies operating abroad, as India emerges as an economic power?
The United States, famous as a nation of immigrants, should also be infamous for its bouts of anti-immigrant sentiment. Often our intolerance has been fueled by national-security fears. At other times, Americans have made misguided assumptions about who immigrants are and the rights that protect them.
When trade negotiators and street protestors in Miami this week debate the impact of a Free Trade Area of the Americas on workers throughout the region, they should consider its precursor, the North American Free Trade Agreement, as a cautionary tale.
The Bush administration is quietly carrying on a major new trade negotiation with Central America that could show -- contrary to the notion that globalization hurts workers -- how international trade deals can increase respect for labor rights. But the Bush team must get the right formula into its briefing books.
Caste-based discrimination is at the heart of bonded labor. Nallanayaki, like the vast majority of bonded laborers, is a dalit, a so-called untouchable, on the lowest rung of India's caste system. Across India, dalits are segregated from their upper-caste counterparts, denied access to land, forced to work in degrading conditions, and expected to perform free labor.
As riot police shut down workers' protests in northeast China, Beijing's diplomats in Geneva have little to worry about. As things now stand, they won't be forced to defend China's treatment of labor organizers, or its crackdown on pro-democracy activists, Tibetans or Internet users. Nor will there be any debate on China's human rights record at the annual meeting of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights now underway in Geneva -- unless the European Union, the U.S. and other key governments act quickly to push for a resolution on the issue.