SANTIAGO — Workers at Chile’s state mining
company Codelco, the largest producer of copper in the world, went on an
“indefinite” strike on Wednesday, unions said, protesting the closure of a
foundry in one of the country’s most polluted regions.
اضافة اعلان
Codelco announced last week that it would close the
Ventanas foundry in the towns of Quintero and Puchuncavi.
The Copper Workers Federation (FTC) released a
statement saying there was “full support for this paralyzation in solidarity
with the workers at the Ventanas division” from Codelco’s other divisions.
FTC president Amador Pantoja told a local television
station the strike will cost Codelco $20 million a day.
The FTC represents around 14,000 Codelco workers and
another 40,000 external contractors, Pantoja added.
Unions described the closure of the Ventanas
foundry, located around 140km west of Santiago, as “arbitrary” and are
demanding the government invests $54 million to bring the plant up to the
highest environmental standards.
The entrance to Ventanas was blocked by burning
roadblocks and dozens of workers waving Chilean flags on Wednesday.
“No to closure, yes to investment,” read one banner.
Codelco’s decision comes after an incident on June 9
when 115 people, mostly school children, suffered sulfur dioxide poisoning
released by heavy industry, provoking the closure of schools in the area.
It was the second such incident in a matter of just
three days.
Sulfur dioxide is a classic air pollutant usually
linked to the burning of fossil fuels.
Greenpeace described the area around the Ventanas
plant as “Chile’s Chernobyl” following a serious incident in 2018 when around
600 people in Quintero and Puchuncavi received medical treatment for symptoms
such as vomiting blood, headaches, dizziness, paralysis of their extremities
and strange red marks on children’s skin.
Last week, President Gabriel Boric hit out at
Chile’s record on polluting the environment.
“We don’t want any more areas of (environmental)
sacrifice,” he said.
“There are now hundreds of thousands of people who
live in our country exposed to severe degradation of the environment that we
have provoked or allowed and, as a Chilean, that makes me feel ashamed.”
Pollution accumulated in the area of Quintero and
Puchuncavi, home to around 50,000 people, after the government decided in 1958
to convert it into an industrial center that now hosts four coal-fired power
stations and oil and copper refineries.
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