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Company Response

31 Jul 2023

Inditex's response to allegations of abuse against unionists & labour activists at Myanmar supplier

[…]

As shared previously with BHRRC, Inditex is in the process of a phased and responsible exit from Myanmar, taking into account the increasing difficulties faced by worker representatives in exercising freedom of association rights. As a result, we continue to reduce the number of active manufacturers in the country.

[…]

Regarding the case mentioned, we would like to inform you that we have maintained a communication channel with Action Labor Rights (ALR) organization since February 2023 regarding this factory. At that time, we were informed about ALR's intention to form a union at the factory. After that, in March 2023, ALR reached us regarding one allegation for which we requested suppliers and the factory to initiate a social dialogue process with ALR and worker representatives that culminated in the form of an agreement between the parties in May 2023.

However, in June, ALR informed us of the dismissal and the detention of several workers and ALR members related with the factory. These events represented a severe breach of our supplier Code of Conduct, so we took immediate action to block this factory for our productions, preventing our suppliers from working with this factory and removing it from our supply chain.

We have activated all available means to remediate the situation and push for the release of the workers through dialogue with suppliers and different institutional actors - these efforts continue to be active today. In this sense, just after the reception of the information from ALR, we formally and informally requested the related suppliers and factory to take all immediate actions to prevent and remediate any harm to the workers' rights, including requests for:

  • The immediate reinstatement of the dismissed workers in their previous positions with related back pay.
  • The absence of any type of reprisal action against workers
  • The immediate remediation of any harm that might have been caused to workers as result of the severe events that have occurred.

[The full response is attached]

Timeline