All complaints from workers in Chinese factories in Serbia

This was stated for Radio Free Europe (RFE) on November 22 by one of the Vietnamese workers engaged in the construction of the Chinese car tire factory "Linglong" in Zrenjanin. His identity is hidden due to possible revenge of the employer.

"Security is here. Yesterday, they allowed some people to go and buy groceries, they were not as strict as in the morning (when they don't let us out)."

This was stated for Radio Free Europe (RFE) on November 22 by one of the Vietnamese workers engaged in the construction of the Chinese car tire factory "Linglong" in Zrenjanin. His identity is hidden due to possible revenge of the employer.

He is one of 500 workers whose problem has been reported by the media for days due to allegations of ill-treatment and the conditions in which they live. They were housed in a factory circle, in barracks, and pictures from that unconditional camp of human rights activists traveled the world.

About 500 Vietnamese workers are now housed in various locations several kilometers from the factory's construction site. RSE's interlocutor states that he is housed in a house in Ečka, about 5 kilometers away from the "Linglong" construction site where he works.

"Now we can't come and go to the construction site freely, we have transportation, outside of working hours I guess we have to be in accommodation," he says.

Twelve human rights NGOs from Belgrade, Zrenjanin and Novi Sad issued a joint statement on November 22, saying relocating Vietnamese workers to several locations made it difficult for them to fight and self-organize, as well as deliver aid.

"The fight is not over, we are still on the ground," the statement said.

The case of Vietnamese workers in Zrenjanin is not the first in Serbia to attract the attention of the media and international human rights organizations due to suspicions that workers for Chinese employers work and live in inhumane conditions, as well as victims of labor exploitation.

In January, RFE reported on the unconditional accommodation of Chinese workers in a temporary camp near the Čukaru Peki mine in Bor, eastern Serbia.

Suspected trafficking for labor exploitation

"We have indicators that in the case of Vietnamese workers engaged in the construction of the Linglong factory, it is human trafficking for the purpose of labor exploitation, ie forced labor," Hristina Piskulidis, spokeswoman for the Belgrade-based NGO Astra, which deals with human trafficking, told RFE / RL.

Piskulidis explains that this type of human trafficking can be recognized by the fact that it is work that workers did not initially agree to, that takes place under conditions that they did not agree to, and that it is a work situation that workers cannot leave when they want.

According to the workers with whom RSE communicated, the employer returned the passports to the workers on November 19. However, the organization "Astra" believes that Vietnamese workers continue to work in conditions that can be called forced.

"When we have threats and intimidation of the employer, we always talk about forced labor. "Their movement is now limited," she said.

Poor living conditions

The Vietnamese worker describes the current conditions in the house where he is accommodated as better than the camp in the area of the "Linglong" factory, where the workers were accommodated until mid-November.

"Currently, many things in the house are being repaired, electricity, water. "The toilet is not good," he said. According to him, about thirty workers are housed in a house that has a ground floor, first floor and attic.

"We know that their passports have been confiscated, that workers have been intimidated on several occasions and that they cannot leave that job whenever they want," Piskulidis said.

On November 17, after a conflict with security, non-governmental activists took out of the factory circle one of the workers who was fired after he spoke publicly about the conditions in which they work. Security had previously banned workers from contacting the media and activists.

Astra representative Piskulidis says that the previous conditions in the camp where the workers stayed until November 18 were "terrible". Namely, the workers were housed in barracks near the construction site in inhumane conditions, and after media reports about their position, the workers were moved to several locations around Zrenjanin, in northwestern Serbia.

"In the barracks, the space that one person had was below the prison minimum, the food preparation rooms were hygienically unconditional, there were two boilers for 500 people," says Piskulidis.

She states that Vietnamese workers protested on several occasions because of the bad conditions, and for the first time because they did not have enough food and, as she states, "they were forced to hunt small game around the camp".

"They sometimes got one egg for breakfast (as they claim), and they are workers who do hard physical work. It sounds like a horror movie, "Pisculidis said.

RFE also reported on the suspension of Vietnamese workers on November 17.

"We have weak electricity and nothing is good here. Go inside and see, "one of the Vietnamese workers told RSE at the time.

Similar testimonies of Chinese workers in Bor

RSE published similar testimonies about poor living conditions in January, when Chinese workers at the Cukaru Peki mine in Bor, owned by the Chinese company Zidjin, also protested the poor conditions at the camp where they are staying.

Workers then sent RSE footage and photos from the camp illustrating very poor conditions, that the toilets are very dirty and used by a large number of people.

"There is dust all over the floor, rubbish in the bathrooms, excrement in the toilets on all sides," said one of the Chinese workers in Bor at the time, who asked us to protect his identity.

Based on RFE testimony, Chinese workers also faced restrictions on movement and intimidation.

Several workers claimed that their employer did not allow them to leave the unconditional camp in which they were accommodated, as well as that they were forbidden contact with the population in Serbia.

"We are prisoners. You are punished if you go out and get caught. That is a big fine, "one of the Chinese workers told RFE / RL in January.

Who are the employers of workers from China and Vietnam?

What is also common for the case of Chinese and Vietnamese workers is that their employers are not well-known Chinese companies that are investors in Serbia.

Namely, the Chinese company "Shandong Linglong", which is building a car tire factory in Zrenjanin, after the reports about the bad conditions in which Vietnamese workers live went public, announced on November 18 that the workers are not employed in their company.

"Vietnamese workers, involved in the Zrenjanin factory construction project, have been hired by one of our contractors, China Energy Engineering Group Tianjin Electric Power Construction (TEPC)," Linglong said.

According to the Business Registers Agency, TEPC has a representative office (branch) in Belgrade and is owned by the company of the same name in China.

Similarly, Chinese workers at the Cukaru Peki mine are not employed by Zidjin, which owns the mine, but by Jinshan Construction, owned by Zidjin, which has publicly denied the workers' claims. poor housing conditions and, in response to RFE's reporting, sent media photos of better conditions than those witnessed by workers.

A spokeswoman for Astra believes that in this way, large Chinese companies are "removing" responsibility for irregularities and poor treatment of workers.

"It is an administrative entanglement that protects the main actors (from responsibility, ed.)," says Hristina Piskulidis.

Appeals of international organizations and (non) reaction of institutions in Serbia

Six members of the European Parliament said on November 19 that they were "appalled by the reports on alleged trafficking in human beings for the purpose of labor exploitation in Serbia", which refer to the position of Vietnamese workers.

The European Parliament's rapporteur for Serbia, Vladimir Bilchik, wrote on the social network Twitter on November 19 that paintings (seen in the media) from the Chinese factory Linglong have no place in 21st century Europe.

"All workers in the candidate countries deserve safe working conditions and appropriate standards of protection. I call on the competent authorities to investigate this case in detail, "Bilcik wrote.

RSE sent questions to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Vietnam regarding this case, but no answer was received until the conclusion of this text.

As for the Chinese workers in Bor, in February, RSE contacted the representatives of the organization from the USA "China Labor Watch", which deals with the conditions in which Chinese workers work in the world, for a statement.

In April, the organization published a report on the situation of Chinese workers working on projects of the Chinese Belt and Road initiative, and the report is partly based on the testimonies of Chinese workers working in Indonesia, Algeria, Singapore, Jordan, Pakistan, Serbia and other countries.

"We have detected widespread violations of rights, including passport retention, restrictions on freedom of movement, overtime up to 12 hours a day and 7 days a week, zero holiday pay ..., unpaid wages, isolation from the local community, intimidation and threats." , is stated in the report of this organization.

On the other hand, according to the assessment of the non-governmental organization "Astra", the competent authorities in Serbia reduce the seriousness of the situation when it comes to foreign workers in Serbia.

The Prime Minister of Serbia, Ana Brnabić, said on November 18 that the labor inspection is constantly on the ground and that on November 17, it was ordered that the workers be relocated and have better conditions. However, in a statement for B92, Brnabic did not rule out the possibility that, as she put it, the attacks on the "Linglong" factory were organized against Chinese investments.

On November 19, the President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, stated that he did not understand the meaning of the media-political campaign against the Chinese company "Linglong" in Zrenjanin and that he was ready to help Vietnamese workers working on its construction.

The Office of the Protector of Citizens announced on November 18 that the Ombudsman's delegation talked on November 17 with representatives of the Zrenjanin Police Administration (PU), as well as with workers and representatives of a company that hires workers from Vietnam, and that it was concluded that all hired foreign workers application and work permit.

On November 18, Minister of Construction, Transport and Infrastructure Tomislav Momirovic confirmed that Vietnamese citizens working on the construction of the "Linglong" factory in Zrenjanin sleep in unconditional premises, but added that they are "very well paid".

According to him, labor inspections went to the field and "did not find any irregularities".

The labor inspection also did not find any irregularities that Chinese workers reported in the camp within the "Čukaru Peki" mine in January, stating that it is not competent to control the living conditions in the camp after working hours, but only work engagement.