The United Steelworkers of America and an international rights group has sued Coca-Cola, alleging trade unionists at plants that bottle the company's soft drinks in Colombia are systematically intimidated, kidnapped and killed.
The lawsuit, filed yesterday on behalf of a Colombian trade union and the estate of a worker allegedly murdered by paramilitary forces in Colombia, also names as a defendant Panamerican Beverages of Miami, Florida, which through a subsidiary operates the Coca-Cola bottling plants in Colombia.
Lawyers for the union and the International Labor Rights Fund said the suit alleged Atlanta-based Coca-Cola failed to ensure that workers at the plants were protected against persecution of trade unionists.
"This case involves the systematic intimidation, kidnapping, detention and murder of trade unionists in Colombia, South America, at the hands of paramilitaries working as agents of corporations doing business in that country," the lawsuit said.
Officials at Panamerican Beverages referred calls for comment to the company's unit in Colombia.
A spokesman for Coca-Cola in Atlanta denied any wrongdoing by the company and said Coca-Cola did not itself run bottling plants in Colombia.
The lawsuit said the persecution of trade unionists in Colombia had been "at epidemic proportions" for years, with more than 3,800 unionists murdered since 1986 when the Central Unitaria de Trabajadores de Colombia was formed.
The case was brought under the Alien Tort Claims Act and US racketeering statutes. It was assigned to US District Judge Paul Huck in Miami.
"With respect to their business operations in Colombia, the Defendants hired, contracted with or otherwise directed paramilitary security forces that utilised extreme violence and murdered, tortured, unlawfully detained or otherwise silenced trade union leaders of the union representing workers at Defendants' facilities," the lawsuit said.
Attorneys for United Steelworkers of America said the aim of the lawsuit was to push Coca-Cola and other companies doing business in Colombia to prevent violence against trade unionists.