The North Shore Colombia Solidarity Committee Blog

Template for letters of support for SINTRACARBON negotiations

1. We (in the U.S. and Canada) receive coal from the Cerrejon mine

2. The union at the mine, Sintracarbon, will begin contract negotiations on November 1.

3. The union has taken a courageous and unprecedented step in including in its bargaining proposal a demand that the collective rights of the Afro-Colombian and indigenous communities affected and/or displaced by the mine be recognized and addressed.

4. The communities are asking for COLLECTIVE NEGOTIATIONS; COLLECTIVE RELOCATION; AND REPARATIONS

5. The labor movement in Colombia has been the target of all-out assault in the past 20 years. Several thousand union leaders and activists have been killed. Not a single one of these murders has been resolved. Assassinations often occur during contract negotiations. In 2001, three union leaders at another U.S.-owned coal mine in the neighboring province were murdered.

6. The government of Denmark has suspended coal purchases from the Drummond mine (where union leaders were killed) until the court case in the U.S. charging Drummond with complicity in the murders is resolved.

We demand:

1. Absolute respect for international labor norms and human rights and the lives and integrity of Sintracarbon members and all Cerrejon workers during the bargaining process and beyond. No military involvement in any labor dispute that might arise. (In the 1990s the mine was occupied by the army on several occasions during labor negotiations.)

2. That the mine recognize the collective rights of the communities and the union’s demand that these rights be recognized

3. That Dominion Energy and other coal purchasers urge the mine to negotiate in good faith with the union, not militarize any labor dispute, and acknowledge the collective rights of the communities.

We affirm:

1. Our support for the unions, workers and peasants of Colombia who are struggling peacefully for a more just distribution of the country’s resources

2. Our support for the rights of the communities of Tabaco, Tamaquito, Chancleta, Roche and Patilla to collective negotiation, collective relocation, and reparations

3. Our support for Sintracarbon in its struggle for the rights of unionized workers, contract workers, and communities in the mining region.