Two French campaign groups filed a legal case against Samsung
in France on Thursday over the alleged use of child labour and other
abuses in Chinese manufacturing plants working for the electronics
giant.
Accusing the company of misleading commercial practices,
the NGOs Peuples Solidaires and Sherpa lodged a complaint in Paris
against Samsung's French subsidiary and international parent company.
Based
on research from the China Labour Watch group, the French campaigners
alleged that children had been found in Chinese plants producing Samsung
products, and that other staff faced severe health problems.
They
took aim at Samsung's stated objective of becoming one of the most
ethical companies in the world, which they said amounted to misleading
consumers and commercial cheating.
"We are asking the justice
system to sanction the unacceptable gap between its ethical commitments
and the reality in its factories as described by Chinese NGOs on the
ground," the French groups said in a statement.
Peuples Solidaires
and Sherpa targeted Samsung unsuccessfully with a previous complaint in
2014, but claim they now have new evidence that backs up their case
based on work by China Labor Watch.
The Chinese group, which sends
undercover workers into factories to report on conditions there, has
produced a series of highly critical reports since 2012 highlighting
abuses at companies that work for Samsung.
The most serious
allegations date back to 2012, however, and Samsung has since carried
out an audit of many of its Chinese suppliers and made public some of
the violations it found.
The company was not available to comment immediately on Thursday.
France
introduced new legislation last year sparked by the Rana Plaza disaster
in Bangladesh, which saw the collapse of a poorly maintained building
housing numerous low-cost clothing companies working for Western brands.
More than a thousand workers were killed in the industrial accident in 2013 and more than 2,000 people were injured.
Under
the so-called Rana Plaza law in France, passed by the Socialist
government in early 2017, the 150 biggest companies based in France are
required to produce a "vigilance plan" covering their contractors and
manufacturers worldwide.
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