Cuba uses slave labor to pay debts
I am sure a workers paradise like Cuba thinks this is a good deal for those who are "lucky" enough to get the jobs. It is another example of the depravity of the Cuban regime and why people risk their life to leave "free health care."Each Cuban worker got two pairs of overalls, a set of sturdy boots, a helmet and food commensurate with how hard he worked.
Their labor fixing up American cruise ships at a Curacao dry dock was valued at $6.90 an hour. But the 108 Cuban shipyard hands who worked double shifts in a joint venture between the Cuban government and the Curacao Dry Dock Company did not get to spend their wages. Their earnings were applied to the Cuban government's debt with the company, court records show.
Documents reviewed Wednesday by The Miami Herald in an ongoing 2006 lawsuit filed in Miami by the workers offer a rare glimpse at employment terms normally kept secret between the Cuban government and the firms with which it does business. The documents appear to offer proof that the government's joint ventures abroad sometimes involve unpaid labor.
Instead of a salary, the men got money for food and 400 Cuban pesos a month -- about $18 at the current exchange rate.
Three former dry-dock workers eventually escaped what their attorneys call a ''forced labor camp'' in Willemstad, Curacao, and filed the suit in U.S. District Court in Miami, alleging the Cuban government offered them up as slave labor to pay off its debts.
Alberto Justo Rodríguez, Fernando Alonso Hernández and Luis Alberto Casanova Toledo -- who now live in the Tampa Bay area -- sued the Curacao Dry Dock Company, saying it forced them to work against their will while Cuban agents kept an eye on their every move.
Their boss at the docks: Fidel Castro's nephew.
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''Because of the significant debt owed by . . . Havana to defendant for repairing ships . . . monies that defendant would otherwise pay to the Havana shipyard for the provision of temporary workers from Cuba are subtracted from the debt owed by the shipyard,'' the company's attorneys wrote in a court filing.
The suit was filed under the Alien Tort Statute, which allows foreigners to file civil suits in U.S. federal courts when a serious international law has been violated. It was unclear how much the Cuban government owed the company.
The court filing responding to the lawsuit added that the workers got a per diem and ''additional benefits.'' Employment contracts show the men were supposed to receive $1,500 a month for a per diem, but the workers say they received only a $12 daily food allotment to spend at the company store.
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The Curacao partner does not look much better in this case.
Will the leftist supporters of Castro still champion the dying despot?
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