<html>
<body>
<font size=4><b>US and Colombian Activists Target "World of
Coca-Cola" <br><br>
</b></font><font size=3>
<a href="http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/2225/1/" eudora="autourl">
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/2225/1/<br>
</a>Written by Matthew Cardinale <br>
Tuesday, 24 November 2009 <br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=3>(IPS) Activists from the U.S. and
Colombia are targeting the World of Coca-Cola museum, located near its
headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, accusing the company of "union
busting", paying its workers "poverty wages", and engaging
in environmentally destructive practices.<br><br>
"We're an unofficial coalition with the India Resource Center,
focusing on Coca-Cola overusing waters in drought areas. We're supporting
Corporate Accountability International, that have been trying to stop the
use of bottled water over tap water," Lew Friedman, of Killer Coke,
told IPS. <br><br>
"We're working on behalf of Sinaltrainal, the food workers in
Colombia. They had eight union leaders murdered. We've been augmenting
their legal suit," Friedman said. <br><br>
"There's plenty of evidence that shows the plant managers were very
cozy with the paramilitaries," he added. <br><br>
Sinaltrainal v. Coca-Cola was filed in 2001 by the United Steelworkers of
America and the International Labor Rights Fund on behalf of the
Colombian trade union Sinaltrainal, several of its members, and the
estate of Isidro Gil, one of its officers who was murdered. <br><br>
Coca-Cola bottlers "contracted with or otherwise directed
paramilitary security forces that utilize extreme violence and murdered,
tortured, unlawfully detained or otherwise silenced trade union
leaders", the lawsuit states. <br><br>
In addition, Killer Coke claims that many of the Colombian paramilitary
troops were trained at the controversial formerly-named School of the
Americas, now called the U.S. Western Hemisphere Institute for Security
and Economic Cooperation, in Fort Benning, Georgia. <br><br>
In 2003, the U.S. District Court removed Coca-Cola as a defendant in the
case because the murders took place in Colombia, not in the U.S. However,
two Coca-Cola bottlers remained as defendants in the case. In 2006, the
judge dismissed the remaining claims. <br><br>
When IPS asked Coca-Cola about Killer Coke's demonstration in Atlanta
last week, the company replied in an email statement that it "was
based on an uninformed and inaccurate portrayal of The Coca-Cola Company
and independent Coca-Cola bottlers in Colombia and based on allegations
that are over ten years old". <br><br>
"The unfounded allegations have been reviewed over the years by
multiple courts in Colombia and most recently in the United States, as
well as by the International Labor Organization, and outside law firms -
all concluding that the Coca-Cola bottler employees in Colombia enjoy
extensive, normal relations with multiple unions and are provided with
safe working conditions there," Coca-Cola said. <br><br>
While much of Killer Coke's focus seemed to be on the Colombian trade
union issue, activists said other issues involved the alleged use of
child labour in other countries and questions about the healthiness of
Coca-Cola products in general. <br><br>
"There are issues of health, the use of high fructose corn
syrup," Friedman said. <br><br>
As part of their campaign, Killer Coke has been successful at getting
over 50 U.S. colleges and universities to stop selling Coke, and at
getting the Service Employee Industrial Union (SEIU) and teachers' unions
to stop carrying Coke in their offices. <br><br>
Killer Coke decided to target Coca-Cola headquarters on its own turf, in
Atlanta, in part by driving a mobile billboard around town that read,
"Don't Drink Killer Coke Zero: Zero Ethics, Zero Justice, Zero
Health." This is a pun on one of the company's products, Coke Zero,
which is a near-zero calorie beverage. <br><br>
"The World of Coke is basically one large advertisement for
Coca-Cola. It's the centre of Coca-Cola, it's a mile away from their
headquarters, it's basically their public image that's there," said
Ian Hoffmann, a young activist from Minnesota. <br><br>
"We've got people coming forward and saying it's an anti-union
company. Coca-Cola usually says 'we're an Atlanta-based company. What
happens in Colombia is out of our control, and more importantly, not our
responsibility', even though they [the bottling plants] are bottling
Coca-Cola products and helping the company with huge profits,"
Hoffmann said. <br><br>
"We want some accountability. From my end, I'd like them to
acknowledge what's going on there, explaining to us why after the union
leader gets shot dead, that the next day no one signs a new contract with
Sinaltrainal. How do they stand by that? How do you defend that?"
Hoffmann said. <br><br>
"If these are people that are working, bottling Coca-Cola products,
how is it okay for this company to stand by and not take some kind of
action?" Hoffmann said. "How could this be happening at
Coca-Cola with management turning a blind eye?" <br><br>
Hoffmann acknowledged it is difficult going up against a multinational
corporation like Coca-Cola. "It's usually difficult because of the
brand name. They have forced their way into every American fridge. The
money they spend to get their name out and marketing to children. It's a
Coke culture, you know, starting out with those ads with Santa
Claus." <br><br>
At a protest last week, activists chanted slogans and played a recording
of a contemporary folk song called, "Coke is the Drink of the Death
Squads". <br><br>
They came from all over the U.S., including states like Illinois, Iowa,
Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, and Minnesota, as well as Washington,
DC. Groups like Witness for Peace and School of the Americas Watch were
also represented. <br><br>
Martha Giraldo, 31, of Colombia, charged Coca-Cola's bottling plants with
"using temp [temporary] workers on contracts three months or less
long, and they don't pay a just wage, exterminating labour leaders,
violating our Constitutional right to be unionised. In Colombia, we're in
a human rights crisis." <br><br>
Giraldo and another speaker spoke to the mostly English-speaking audience
through a translator. <br><br>
"People are marginalised in large cities of our country. We're all
suffering a humanitarian crisis. It's not true what [Secretary of State]
Hillary Clinton says when she says in Colombia we're safe and live in
peace. It's only for some, large landowners and the paramilitary; the
rest are marginalised for denouncing it. We are being accused of being
guerrilla supporters," Giraldo said. <br><br>
"In Colombia there are four million internally displaced people,
who've been driven off their land because of terror campaigns of the
paramilitary," Giraldo said. "In addition to fumigating coca
crops and food crops and water sources we use to drink, approximately
30,000 people disappeared in Colombia. We don't know where they are. It's
been years since they disappeared." <br><br>
"We're here in front of one of the symbols of capitalism. This
company represents one of the perverse ways of accumulating capital.
We're here to demonstrate on behalf of our dead brothers," said
Gerardo Caja Marca in a speech at the rally. <br><br>
"They systematically violate human rights in Colombia. All workers
have the right and obligation to defend their rights. Simply exercising
those rights has cost the lives of workers in Colombia," Caja Marca
said. <br><br>
"Lastly we came here to demand justice. These are the men of war.
These are the ones who put seven US military bases in Colombia. These are
the ones who create paramilitaries. We accuse Coca-Cola of financing
assassins. We want truth and reparations," Caja Marca said.
<br><br>
<br><br>
</font><x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
<font size=3 color="#FF0000">Freedom Archives<br>
522 Valencia Street<br>
San Francisco, CA 94110<br><br>
</font><font size=3 color="#008000">415 863-9977<br><br>
</font><font size=3 color="#0000FF">
<a href="http://www.freedomarchives.org/" eudora="autourl">
www.Freedomarchives.org</a></font><font size=3> </font></body>
</html>