Global: Amazon urged to support tortured whistleblower
A whistleblower who exposed illegal working conditions in a factory making Amazon’s Alexa devices and who was then tortured before being jailed by Chinese authorities has called on the company’s founder Jeff Bezos to protect its supply chain workers. Tang Mingfang, 43, was jailed after he revealed how the Foxconn factory in the southern Chinese city of Hengyang used schoolchildren working illegally long hours to manufacture Amazon’s popular Echo, Echo Dot and Kindle devices. Now, after spending two years in prison, he is appealing to the higher courts to clear his name. The illegal working practices at the factory were first revealed in an investigation by the Observer and the US-based China Labor Watch in 2018. A year later, a second investigation found that Foxconn had tried to solve its subsequent recruitment problems by drafting in schoolchildren to work illegal overtime. Internal Foxconn documents passed on by Tang formed the basis of the second investigation. Amazon sent its own staff into the factory to investigate the labour law breaches and Foxconn was forced to pay more than £165,000 in compensation for underpaying workers making Echo and Echo Dot devices in Hengyang. Meanwhile, Foxconn brought in the Chinese authorities to investigate the leak. Tang was charged, convicted and jailed for two years. Tang claims the statements used to convict him were obtained by the use of torture and should not have been admissible in evidence. He said Foxconn had promised to improve working conditions after the first investigation but its own internal documents suggested managers were planning to expand the illegal use of workers. After talking to colleagues about what was going on in the factory, Tang contacted China Labor Watch and agreed to share some of the company documents, which he photographed using his mobile phone. In a letter to Amazon founder Bezos, Tang urged him to ensure that workers’ rights are protected. “Although the price was too high for me, I think the price I paid will all be worth it if only this situation can be brought to your attention and benefit the employees of all Amazon suppliers,” he wrote. China Labor Watch director Li Qiang also wrote to Bezos urging him to intervene on behalf of Tang, noting: “All he did was report violations of workers’ rights in an Amazon supplier factory. He did not commit any illegal acts. It is unacceptable and unfair that Tang Mingfang is serving jail time for trying to help Amazon improve the labour conditions in its supplier factory.”
China Labor Watch news release. Tang Mingfang’s letter to Jeff Bezos and Amazon executives. The Observer.
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