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UNI General Secretary, Philip Jennings, will denounce human rights abuses by Prosegur in Colombia next week, in a speech to the United Nations Economic and Social Council at UN headquarters in New York. The Minister of Labour of Colombia and the Director-General of the ILO will be panellists, along with Jennings, in a discussion on "making dignity and prosperity something normal."

Prosegur has been denounced for a number of human rights abuses against its Colombian employees, including: linking union leaders to "terrorism"; suing staff who collectively denounced human rights abuses in the company for more than U$S 1 million; allowing a manager to continue working after punching a union leader in the mouth leaving him incapacitated for eight days.

In March, the Bogota Metropolitan Police carried out an almost two-week search for the legal representative of Prosegur due to his non-compliance with a final court ruling.

Jennings will cover following subjects in his address at the UN:

* Colombian authorities have to do more to promote the rule of law and therefore the dignity, prosperity and human rights of Colombians.

* Prosegur is a company that is operating outside the rule of law, and the Colombian government is not sufficiently interested in making this company comply with national laws.

* The legal representative of the company should have been captured this month, in accordance with the arrest warrant issued by the court in Colombia.

* Two criminal complaints have been filed with the Attorney General's Office of Colombia against representatives of Prosegur for violating the country’s Penal Code. These complaints have never been investigated by the Colombian authorities. Possible violations include bonus payments of U$S 2,000 and U$S 1,000 to non-union members to promote the signing of a Pacto Colectivo (form of collective contract only for non-union staff), encouraging workers to leave the union. These bonus payments to non-union members are prohibited by Article 200 of the Penal Code in Colombia.

* UNI agrees with the vision of a modern Colombia based on respect for human rights, rule of law and social dialogue. However, the government and the Colombian authorities must investigate and prosecute those who violate laws and human rights.

* The Colombian government must do more to make a reality of this modern vision that they are articulating abroad, and Prosegur is an example of the Colombia that we hope will remain in the past.

* One of the priorities of President Juan Manual Santos’ government is Colombia's entry into the OECD, which requires the country to reach certain standards in human and labour rights. To date the only complaint filed with the OECD against a company operating in Colombia is that of Prosegur.