International Trade committee  Very good. Fine.

International Trade committee  Thank you very much for the opportunity to testify about labour rights in Jordan. When the institute began its work in Jordan, we discovered that over the course of the five years from 2001 until 2006, the United States-Jordan free trade agreement had descended into human traffi

International Trade committee  Yes, of course. There are also articles from the Wall Street Journal, the Huffington Post, and Associated Press.

International Trade committee  I think the problem in Jordan is that there's very little actual research on worker conditions and factory conditions. It sounds maybe too bad to say it, but Jordan is a very corrupt country. You can buy anybody off very easily. For example, with the Rich Pine Factory I just sp

International Trade committee  We could hope so, but there would have to be a whole new Ministry of Labour. There would have to be real pressure from the U.S. government. Speaking in terms of the U.S.-Jordan free trade agreement, our government knows exactly what's going on, because inside that cable they sa

International Trade committee  Well, yes, under the U.S.-Jordan free trade agreement the rights are quite specific. They're the ILO, International Labour Organization, rights for collective bargaining and organizing. Jordanian law is completely different. Recently, when we were in Jordan we saw the president

International Trade committee  Yes, Anil Santha has a long history of raping women. He did it in Dubai, and he did it in Kuwait, I think. People know him quite well.

International Trade committee  He has now been suspended, but we don't really know what the status is. He's not entering the factory every day, but he is still in Jordan.

International Trade committee  It's been over 25 years.

International Trade committee  Well, actually, the U.S.-Jordan free trade agreement was the model, and it was endorsed by the AFL-CIO. It was endorsed by the labour movement in the United States. It was endorsed by very progressive unions like the Steelworkers. In other words, this was really the first breakth

International Trade committee  Well, it would have been the Jordan one, but in fact we travelled to Mexico. There were many problems under NAFTA. We went to Central America. We worked there for years. There were lots of problems under the U.S.-Central America free trade agreement. We were hoping that the Jorda

International Trade committee  Yes, it's not being upheld.

International Trade committee  In the case of Jordan in particular, this is a very strange free trade agreement, because you have guest workers coming from China, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar; the Jordanians wouldn't work in the factories. Only now are Jordanians working in the factory, and usuall

International Trade committee  It's 100%. In other words, there are no garment factories without guest workers; the Jordanians won't work in the factories there. I understand that there's one Jordanian factory now getting off the ground that is fully Jordanian workers. I have to apologize, as I don't know en

International Trade committee  Yes. The problem is that the free trade agreement has been up and running for more than 10 years and has failed the workers. The will is just not there. If it had been implemented correctly, this would indeed have been a new model. This would be something that the United States,