The AFL-CIO welcomes the Burmese government’s decision to remove some 2,000 people from a blacklist of more than 6,000 banned from entering the country.  Among those affected by this decision is Maung Maung, the general secretary of the ITUC-affiliated Federation of Trade Unions of Burma (FTUB). After decades in exile, Maung Maung’s return represents an important step in Burma’s history and provides hope to millions of unorganized workers.

Guy Ryder was elected Monday as the new director-general of the International Labor Organization (ILO). He says his new post is a:

tremendous opportunity, in the middle of this global crisis, to make a difference to the lives of millions of people...to change their lives for the better.

The London Organizing Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) has agreed to get tougher with factories in China.

Pressure by unions, advocacy groups and workers themselves has resulted in new protections for workers making badges and mascots for the London 2012 Olympic Games.

Today, International Women’s Day 2012, marks a disappointing statistic: Worldwide, women are paid 18 percent on average less than their male counterparts at work. This startling fact comes from a new report released yesterday by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).

Seven current or former members of the Guatemalan  banana workers’ union have been murdered since 2011. Most recently, Miguel Angel González Ramírez, a member of the Izabal banana workers’ union, was shot while he was holding his young son.

AFL-CIO Industrial Union Council Director Bob Baugh, a member of a global union delegation led by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), sends us another in a series of reports on the new round of United Nations climate change negotiations taking place now in Durban, South Africa.

AFL-CIO Industrial Union Council Director Bob Baugh, a member of a global union delegation led by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), sends us another in a series of reports on the new round of United Nations climate change negotiations taking place now in Durban, South Africa.

AIDS and HIV remain a major public health issue around the world, and so does workplace discrimination against people with AIDS/HIV.

AFL-CIO Industrial Union Council Director Bob Baugh, a member of a global union delegation led by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), sends us the first report on the new round of United Nations climate change negotiations taking place now in Durban, South Africa.

The 17th annual meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP 17) opened in Durban with a speech by South African President Jacob Zuma that stressed the need for dialogue, green jobs and investment. As trade unionists, we are here in force to ensure that these goals are met and that any climate agreement includes workers’ voice.  

As world leaders head to France for the the G-20 economic summit in Cannes, labor leaders from around the globe will gather nearby to represent the needs of the world’s workers. Among their demands is a Robin Hood tax on banks and financial institutions that would exact a nano-percentage of each financial transaction to the tune of 0.5 percent. (See video.) That’s one half of 1 percent on every bond or derivative traded, stocks sold and a host of other “financial instruments” bought and sold by the very institutions bailed out by the world’s taxpayers.