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News: US Ties Unocal to Burma Force



Note:  The release below pulls direct quotes from a US Government report
on labor in Burma.  Interested readers are urged to read the report (url
below).  It contradicts Unocal public statements, and corroborates an
admission under oath by Unocal President John Imle, that forced labor has
indeed been used on a project from which the corporation hopes to profit.


FREE BURMA: NO PETRO-DOLLARS FOR SLORC - PRESS RELEASE

"This is a direct contradiction of Unocal's arrogant denials about forced
labor, and it is the beginning of the end of Unocal's partnership with the
Burmese junta" Robert Benson, professor of law, Loyola Law School

For immediate release:


US GOVERNMENT REPORT "BEGINNING OF THE END" FOR UNOCAL IN BURMA


Los Angeles, October 6 -- A US Government report, released on the World
Wide Web last Friday, may sound a death knell for oil giant Unocal's
partnership with the military junta in Burma.

Unocal, along with France's Total, is involved in a joint venture with
the Burmese regime to pipe natural gas from offshore Burmese fields to
neighboring Thailand.  The pipeline is known as the Yadana project.

The US report, prepared by the Department of Labor (DOL) in consultation
with the Department of State (DOS), is an inventory of misery suffered by
Burmese citizens at the hands of a military junta, which has violently
suppressed a nationwide democracy movement and ignored an overwhelming
defeat in national elections.  The report is found at
<http://www.dol.gov/dol/ilab/public/media/reports/ofr/burma/main.htm>. 

Unocal has categorically denied allegations from by refugees from the area
and respected human rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch and
Earth Rights International that forced labor has been used on the pipeline
project, saying, "There has never been forced labor on the pipeline."  But
findings in the US Government report flatly contradict Unocal's
statements:  "The preponderance of available evidence warrants several
conclusions about the use of forced labor on the pipeline project. For the
early phases of the Yadana pipeline project, refugee accounts of forced
labor appear to be credible in light of Embassy reporting about the
pipeline and the Total documents to which it refers." 

"This is a direct contradiction of Unocal's arrogant denials about forced
labor, and it is the beginning of the end of Unocal's partnership with the
Burmese junta," commented Robert Benson, professor of law at Loyola Law
School in Los Angeles.  "The U.S. Department of Labor applied the
"preponderance of the evidence test" which is the test that will be
applied by juries in the two lawsuits pending in U.S. Federal Court
against Unocal brought by Burmese refugees and trade unionists. The
finding clearly supports the lawsuits.  It is also more than sufficient to
trigger a legal duty by Attorney General Dan Lungren of California to
initiate judicial proceedings to revoke Unocal's corporate charter and put
it out of existence."  On September 10, 1998, the National Lawyers Guild,
acting for a coalition of 30 groups and individuals, petitioned Lungren to
revoke Unocal's charter but Lungren quickly refused without explanation. 

The report also notes that villages were forcibly removed from the
pipeline path, and that this fact is even confirmed by the Burmese
military.  But Unocal has written to its shareholders, saying,
"Allegation: Villages along the pipeline route have been depopulated and
the residents forcibly relocated. Fact: Our observers saw no such
evidence... They found just the opposite...If there were any possibility
that our project was connected with human rights abuses, this would be
absolutely unacceptable to us."

The Government report conclusively states that pipeline-area workers were
"hired" by the military, not by the oil companies. Elsewhere in the
report, military authorities are shown conclusively to forcibly recruit
those whom they claim to "hire." It states, "According to Unocal, 'The
Total affiliate, as project operator, is responsible for all day-to-day
operations relating to the pipeline, including hiring all labor . . . The
Government of Myanmar does not provide or arrange for personnel to work on
the pipeline.' However, during a January 1996 visit to the pipeline, an
Embassy officer reported that, 'Total officials stressed that Total pays
these local workers directly, EVEN THOUGH THEY ARE HIRED BY THE ARMY.'"
(emphasis included in DOL/DOS report). 

Further, the report says, "Refugees interviewed by Amnesty International
and other groups have identified many of the same battalions identified by
Total as having 'hired' civilians to work on infrastructure development
projects and serve as military porters in the area of the pipeline. 
Transcripts of interviews published by the Karen Human Rights Group
include similar allegations of forced labor and forced portering. The U.N. 
Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Burma has received accounts of
abuses by these units from refugees fleeing Ye Pyu Township, who claimed
that soldiers from I.B. (Infantry Battalion) 408 conducted several
executions in August 1994.  The Special Rapporteur also received
allegations that troops from I.B. 410 raped five women from Ta Yoke Taung
village in Ye Township."

"Enough is enough.  Unocal is now tied to rape, to murder, to forced labor
and forced relocation," says Pam Wellner of the No Petro-Dollars for SLORC
campaign. "Unocal is the only big US company still in Burma, not to
mention the best corporate friend of Afghanistan's Taliban.  Now is the
time for Congress to assert that slave labor is unacceptable for American
companies by targeting Unocal for sanctions, and now is the time for the
Attorney General of California to take legal steps to dissolve this
California-based corporate monster."


Contact:	Robert Benson, Loyola School of Law, 213-736-1094
		Pam Wellner, No Petro-Dollars for SLORC,415-695-1946
		Dr. Carol Richards, Burma Forum LA, 310-451-4493
		Larry Dohrs, Free Burma Coalition, 206-784-5742

See also a report on Burmese forced labor by the International Labor
Organization at: http://www.ilo.org .

END