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A trade union has been set up for Foxconn, a Taiwan-invested company that was embroiled in a messy lawsuit with a local newspaper that exposed poor labor practices at the IT company's Shenzhen plant where iPods are assembled.

 

Foxconn, the largest Sino-foreign joint venture in Shenzhen which employs at least 200,000 workers, had not established a trade union after years of negotiations. A trade union can be established in any enterprise in China with a minimum of 25 workers.

 

Altogether 118 Foxconn employees joined the trade union on Sunday, which was set up for Foxconn by the general trade union of Shenzhen. No one from the company's management attended the group's inaugural meeting, the South China Metropolitan News reported on Monday.

 

"This is an innovative move," said Duan Xinqing, a local trade union official who represents the newly established organization at Foxconn. "It'll help promote the protection of workers' rights in other foreign-funded and private businesses."

 

Duan said the group will rent an office in Longhua District, where Hongfujin Precision Industry Co. -- the largest Foxconn facility -- is located.

 

He said the trade union will recruit more members from among Foxconn’s employees even if Foxconn sets up its own trade union as it has been promising to do.

 

A spokesman from Foxconn said the company had planned to set up its own trade union in January. "We started making preparations in November," said Liu Zhongxian. "But I was not aware the city trade union was about to set up one for us."

 

The city trade union says it has been trying to persuade Foxconn to set up a labor union since 2004, but it just never happened. The two sides agreed in 2006 that a union had to be established before the end of the year.

 

The city trade union had also been pressing 29 other companies, mostly privately-owned or foreign-invested, to establish labor unions in 2006.

 

The China Business News reported on June 15 that many of Foxconn's workers had to work while standing for 12 hours a day and some fainted with fatigue.

 

In early July, Foxconn filed a lawsuit against the two journalists who wrote the report, demanding 30 million yuan (US$3.75 million) in compensation.

 

The company slashed its defamation claim to just one yuan in August and dropped the lawsuit altogether in early September.

 

Foxconn and the newspaper then released a joint statement saying they would apologize to each other, collaborate to protect workers' rights and contribute to building a harmonious society.

 

Foxconn Group's wholly-owned subsidiary in Shenzhen, Hongfujin Precision Industry Co., produces iPods for US-based Apple Inc.

 

(Xinhua News Agency January 2, 2007)