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Article

25 May 2015

Author:
Daniel Schweimler, Al Jazeera

Argentina: Two boys die in “clandestine workshops” allegedly supplying to Inditex; company responds to Al Jazeera

“No action as Argentina's illegal sweatshops flourish”

In Argentina they call sweatshops talleres clandestinos or clandestine workshops…[The] one on the corner of Páez and Terrada streets in the Flores neighbourhood of Buenos Aires… [where] there was a fire there last month that killed two young boys, Rolando and Rodrigo…Since the fire, the Alameda Foundation…has identified hundreds more sweatshops in and around Buenos Aires which, along with Sao Paulo, has one of the greatest concentrations of the illegal textile industry in South America… More than 100 well known national and international brands, (including the Spanish firm Zara [part of Inditex] and the sports giants Puma and Adidas) have been named in legal proceedings as alleged sweatshop customers…Like Rolando and Rodrigo, most of the workers come from Bolivia, enticed to Argentina with the promise of housing and well-paid jobs…A few days after the fire at Páez 2796, Bolivian workers and Argentine trade unions…marched to the site of another sweatshop fire that in 2006 killed six Bolivian workers, five of them children.  The owners were never prosecuted. Two managers are appealing against their three-year jail sentences…And what shopper doesn't want brand name clothing at knockdown prices?  But Rolando and Rodrigo, aged 10 and seven, paid the highest price of all. [Inditex sent a response to Al Jazeera in Spanish].