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Last Tuesday Masum (Abul Basher M. Moniruzzaman)..

Masum, 06.2005/anti-war demo in Seoul

..MTU's General Secretary, since 11.27 imprisoned in Cheongju Immigration Detention Center - wrote and sent an open letter (sorry, but we received it just y'day).
Here you can read the full text:

Greetings,

I am Masum, the General Secretary of the Migrants' Trade Union. On November 27th at 8:30am I was arrested by the Immigration Authorities near my home.

Shortly after I was arrested our president was arrested near his house and our vice president near his workplace. The arrests and imprisonment of three MTU-central officers with in one hour on the same day is no small incident. The Immigration Authorities may say it is simply their job to carry out the crackdown, but arresting three union members on the same day at the same time has to be called union repression.

Our organization was founded on April 24, 2005 in order to fight for the human rights and labor rights of foreign workers in South Korea. Our officers were elected through a democratic process by our union members. Officers in the central leadership serve for a two-year term. We must carry out our duty for two years. MTU is an organization that is protesting the government's discriminatory policy towards migrant workers, fighting for more labor rights for migrant workers and calling for legalization of all undocumented migrant workers. We area also an organization that is working in solidarity with many social movement organizations to end distinction between Korean and foreign workers and win equal pay for equal work. We are carrying out national education and many other activities to stop Immigration's man-hunting crackdown and forced deportations.

MTU has been received with discrimination and repression by the South Korean government since it was founded. The crackdown has been severe in areas were MTU is well organized and many union members and officers have been arrested, imprisoned and deported in the course of the crackdown.

MTU's first president, President Anwar, was arrested within 10 days after we submitted our noticed of union establishment and imprisoned for 1 year. After him, our officers have been targeted, arrested and deported. I would like to tell the story of a few of these people.

After the Immigration Authorities came together with other agencies to carry out the joint crackdown most of our branch and chapter officers have been targeted, arrested and deported. Among them, in addition our members and officers in Suwon, Masan, Osan, Seoul, Anyang, Uijeongbu, Namyangju, Paju, Ilsan, Goyang City, Incheon and other places have been forcibly deported including our Seoul Branch Leader, Seongsu Chapter Leader, Ansan Chapter Leader and many others.

Although the Ministry of Labor turned down our notification of union establishment the High Court made a ruling on February 1, 2007 telling the Ministry of Labor to acknowledge our official union status. However the Labor Ministry refused to listen and has filed an appeal. The Supreme Court trail is currently underway.

The Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Labor are trying to deport MTU officers chosen by our union members in order to influence the Supreme Court decision so that they can continue to deny migrant workers' labor rights and repress us.

If an organization or union does not have officers democratically elected by its members then it looses trust. In addition, MTU is to pick a new central leadership to fill our spaces there has to be a General Assembly and the consent of the union members has to be obtained through a new vote. In the current situation, this is impossible.

The current situation is that the Ministry of Labor and the Ministry of Justice are trying to completely crush the voices of migrant workers who have come to South Korea to work by imprisoning MTU's president, vice president and general secretary and therefore influencing the Supreme Court decision.

Right now, the labor rights of migrant workers are not recognized by the Employment Permit System which was supposedly made to protect migrant workers' rights. Because of there is no right to move freely from one workplace to another migrant workers become undocumented while they still have legal visas. They are caught by the Immigration Authorities and then forced to leave the country. There are even many cases where migrant workers become undocumented because they or their employers do not know the proper legal procedures. The EPS is not one bit useful for migrant workers. They say that average work time has become longer than before, wages have gone down and human rights abuses have become more frequent.

MTU has always believed and still believes that migrant workers should received the same labor rights as Korean workers and equal pay for equal work in accordance with the Labor Standards Law.

 
There should be one law for all the migrant workers who come to South Korea. Because of the discriminatory law the whole lives of migrant workers are getting worse and worse. In particular, the Ministry of Justice has made a proposal for an anti-discrimination law, but in the proposal 7 out of 20 of the stipulations regarding prohibition of discrimination have been erased. There are two references to migrant workers. The first is language and the second is country of origin. In terms of country of origin there is a discriminatory attitude towards people who come to work in South Korea from Africa or Asia.

MTU protests this attitude. In the midst of all this, MTU's officers have been arrested and are about to be deported. This is obvious repression against MTU and discrimination against migrant workers. From this act we can clearly see the message of the Ministry of Justice and its affiliated agencies: Migrant workers- you must live in South Korea under discrimination without human rights or labor rights!

 
I believe that in this situation, the National Human Rights Commission must be at the front in fighting for migrant workers labor rights and human rights. The Human Rights Commission must demand the release of MTU officers imprisoned in Cheongju Detention Center and MTU members imprisoned in Hwaseong Detention Center.

 
Finally, we are people who are working for South Korea, We are not criminals. We simply want to receive fair treatment as workers while we are here. The South Korean government does not even show the slightest manners toward migrant workers who have been working in this land form any years. We also want to help South korea to receive the trust of other countries and move forward together on the path towards a multi-cultural society. Thank you for your time.

Stop the Crackdown and Deportations!

Legalize all Migrant Workers!

Win the 3 Labor Rights!

MTU General Secretary Masum, Fighting inside Cheongju Detention Center.

2007, December 4