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Korean police violated E.Land workers' human rights when they forcibly ended sit-in strikes in the Korean capital last month. According to leading English-language newspaper Korea Times, 37 human rights groups have filed a joint petition with the National Human Rights Commission.

The  petition points at human rights violations on several occasions when the police went to attack against striking shop workers at the Seoul World Cup Stadium Homever store on 20 July, and the Kangnam New Core Outlet department store on 31 July.

E.Land worker asked to take off pants in police cell

At one of the Seoul police stations where workers were forcibly taken, at least one of them was forced to take off his pants in the police cell. Another E.Land worker was also ordered to strip and was asked whether he would go to a sauna with the police officer.

At still another police post, a worker was handcuffed during two hours of questioning. A woman worker was reportedly groped at her beasts in a police car.

Poor explanations by police who cannot deny facts

The responses by the police, as reported by Korea Times, give the impression of being attempts to explain rather than to deny that the incidents have taken  place:

- Regarding the petition, Jongam police said they never ordered the workers to remove clothing but investigated them in gowns and underwear. Gwanak police also said handcuffing suspects during questioning is a routine measure taken when suspects are likely to run away or hurt themselves, the newspaper reports.

The E.Land labour conflict has been going on for more than  two months, sparked by management's mass dismissals of supermarket cashiers, shop workers and other workers who did not have a permanent and regular employment contract. This came as the company wanted to escape its obligations under a new law to regularise these part-timers and other non-regular employees after two years of employment.

Park Sung Soo remains quiet when he should protect his workers

E.Land is a Korean retail chain, originally a textile retailer, founded by Park Sung-soo (Park Song-su). Mr Park has approached his business activities with a very high religious Christian profile, liking to give an impression that this is more of a missionary venture than an economic one.

Against this background, it is difficult to understand that he continues to keep quiet as his workers, most of whom are young women, are harassed through management action, attacked at pickets by thugs hired by his company and forcibly dragged away from peaceful sit-in strikes by heavily equipped riot police.

Even more appalling is that Mr Park apparently supports and accepts the kind of behaviour, including sexual harassment, that the 37 Korean human rights groups report on. Through this approach, instead of negotiating normally with the trade union of his employees, he is damaging his own company and putting at risk the jobs of the thousands of workers that it employs.

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