[Reader-list] dutch-indian cybercrime

[geert lovink]

Dutch NGOs summoned by Bangalore court

INDIA-SAARC
23 June 2007 - Issue : 735

Two non-governmental organisations (NGOs) based in the Netherlands were 
asked to appear before a court in Bangalore on June 25. They are 
accused of “cybercrime, acts of racist and xenophobic nature and 
criminal defamation,” according to the NGO’s pres release. The two 
organizations are the Clean Clothes Campaign (CCC) and the India 
Committee of the Netherlands (ICN).

The former is an international network of trade unions and NGOs, the 
latter an independent NGO, based on solidarity with deprived groups in 
Indian society. They have been raising public “awareness of serious 
labour rights’ violations” at jeans suppliers Fibres and Fabrics 
International and its wholly-owned subsidiary Jeans Knit Pvt. Ltd 
(FFI/JKPL).

This is the first time that a factory has filed suit against the CCC 
and ICN for publishing information on working conditions in the garment 
industry on their respective websites, their press release points out.

Their information was based on interviews with workers conducted in 
2005 and 2006, and backed up by a fact-finding mission of seven human 
rights’ and women’s rights organisations.

Since July 2006 the Garment and Textile Workers’ Union (GATWU), the New 
Trade Union Initiative (NTUI), the Civil Initiative for Peace and 
Development (CIVIDEP), the Women Garment Workers’ Front Munnade and the 
CCC Task Force Tamil Naidu have been prohibited from distributing 
information on working conditions at FFI/JKPL inside and outside India.

“Suing all human rights organizations that report about working 
conditions in the garment industry in Bangalore will not solve 
anything,” according to Esther de Haan, of the CCC International 
Secretariat and one of the accused. She called on FFI/JKPL to start a 
dialogue with GATWU and the other organisations, according to the 
CCC/INC press release.