After a five-year campaign, Colombian oil workers’ union USO, has won a major victory as state-owned oil company, Ecopetrol, takes full control of the country’s largest oilfield at Campo Rubiales.

More than 3,000 members of independent trade unions in Sri Lanka demonstrated against severe anti-union discrimination in Free Trade Zones (FTZs) in the country. 

Women trade union leaders in Malaysia vowed to push for 40 per cent women representation in IndustriALL statutes ahead of the world Congress in Rio in October 2016. 

IndustriALL Global Union has expressed outrage at the five-year sentence handed down to Korean union leader Han Sang-gyun by a Seoul Central District Court on 4 July.

On 23 June 2016, the people of the UK voted by a narrow majority to leave the European Union, called “Brexit". While unions fight to defend workers’ rights, world leaders, particularly in Europe, must hear the message that the system is not working.

Some 64 IndustriALL Global Union affiliates from all regions of the world have sent protest letters to the President of South Korea condemning the criminal charges brought against the leader of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), Han Sang-gyun.

The Guatemalan trade union leader, Brenda Marleni Estrada Tambiento, died after being hit by five bullets. IndustriALL condemns the killing and calls on the government to intervene to stop the persecution of trade unions and social movements in the country.

Workers from the Nissan plant in Canton, Mississippi, US, with the support of IndustriALL Global Union and French metal affiliates of FTM-CGT, FGMM-CFDT, CFE-CGC Métallurgie and FO Métaux stage a joint protest in front of the building where the World Works Committee of Renault takes place.

The Paris Agreement, signed in December 2015 to cut global greenhouse gas emissions and limit climate change, will have a significant impact on IndustriALL’s sectors. Unions need to look at public policies at the national level and develop action to ensure a Just Transition for workers.

After the murderous attacks on 10 October 2015, 17 February, 18 March and 19 March 2016, another massacre through suicide bombers with guns happened on 28 June in Turkey. This time the target was Atatürk Airport in Istanbul, one of the leading hubs. So far, 41 innocent people have been killed, while 239 are reported to be injured.

In October, more than 1,000 union leaders from all five continents will gather to Rio de Janeiro for the second congress of IndustriALL Global Union, to take a number of important decisions, but also to show our support for Brazilian unions.

The call for 40 per cent representation rang loud and clear at IndustriALL’s Asia-Pacific women’s committee meeting in Thailand on 20 June 2016. Participants endorsed their resolution proposing that IndustriALL Global Union’s Statutes be changed to include a 40 per cent quota for women’s representation in IndustriALL's structures.

Seventeen workers from Agh Dareh gold mine in Iran were publicly flogged in May, while a prominent jailed union activist has embarked on a hunger strike.

In a joint statement, IndustriALL Global Union, UNI Global Union, the ITF and IUF global unions and the ITUC are calling on IKEA to end anti-union activities in the US. The call comes as workers at a US IKEA store are being prevented from organizing by a campaign of misinformation and obstruction by management.

IndustriALL Philippines held a three-day training workshop on organizing skills to enhance the capacity of field organizers.

Indonesian pulp and paper union FSP2KI has successfully reinstated dismissed contract workers, as well as turning them into directly employed permanent employees.

14 June was a day of struggle for Brazil’s oil industry workers defending the state oil company Petrobras and the Pre-Salt oilfields. Workers have called on the general public to unite to resist and win the battle.

Dibeth Quintana, a leader of the oil workers’ union, USO, was assaulted several times by an Ecopetrol security supervisor and national police officers. IndustriALL condemns this attack and demands guarantees from the Colombian government.

Young workers affiliated to IndustriALL unions in Chile met to discuss union policies at a seminar in Santiago on 2 and 3 June.

Forty-one-year-old Han Kwang-ho was under constant attack for his trade union activities. Friday 24 June marks 100 days since Han, a union organizer at a Hyundai auto part supplier in South Korea, committed suicide.