Local health authorities across China have been asked to improve
check to small brick kilns, coal mines and workshops on
occupational diseases as part of efforts to prevent labor
abuse.
Local health authorities should improve supervision and make
sure that employers provide medical check-ups and treatment to its
employees, who are found to have worked in dangerous or poisonous
work environments, a circular issued by the Ministry of Health
says.
Health authorities are also required to cooperate with police,
labor departments and work safety authorities, and "report
immediately" to relevant departments on the illegal activities
discovered in the working place.
The use of forced laborers hit the headlines after more than 400
parents in central China's Henan Province posted an online
petition, calling for help in rescuing their children who had been
sold to work in small brick kilns in Shanxi and Henan as forced
laborers.
More than 570 people, including 41 children, had been rescued
from illegal brick kilns in the two provinces and nearly 160 people
have been arrested in police operations after the government
ordered a nationwide investigation and rescue campaign.
A total of 95 Party officials in Shanxi have been punished in
the wake of the slave labor scandal. Some were expelled from the
Party, or removed from government posts, or given disciplinary
warnings for lax supervision and dereliction of duty. Eight
officials being investigated by the judicial department face
criminal charges.
(Xinhua News Agency July 21, 2007)