Canadian Neocolonialism in Colombia

By Asad Ismi In May, the board of Pacific Rubiales, a Canadian firm and the biggest private oil producer in Colombia, announced its support for a takeover bid by the Mexican conglomerate Alfa and U.S.-based Harbour Energy. Pacific Rubiales operates Colombia’s biggest oil field, in the province of Meta, and during the past seven years […]

Bangladeshis Victims of Corporate Exploitation: Western companies responsible for deaths of garment workers

By Asad Ismi In April 2013, the Rana Plaza building collapsed in Dhaka, Bangladesh, killing 1,129 garment workers and injuring more than 2,500. The building contained four garment factories. This was the worst industrial disaster in Bangladesh’s history, and the worst in the garment sector’s history. As of late January, workers and their families were […]

Capitalism is the Crisis (Part 2): India’s Landless People Blame Impoverishment on Capitalism

By Asad Ismi India’s poor rural majority has benefited little from the country’s economic boom, and in fact has seen its position worsen. The same pro-free-market economic reforms that have made India attractive to Western capital and benefited the urban-based middle and upper classes have increased the impoverishment of the rural population which comprises about […]

Canadian Companies in Colombia Linked to Murders, Repression: Oil, Mining Firms Open to Charge of Complicity in Genocide

By Asad Ismi On May 3, the third edition of my report Profiting from Repression: Canadian Investment in and Trade with Colombia was released by the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) in Ottawa. The comprehensive 184-page report links ten Canadian companies in Colombia to the genocide of indigenous Colombians, to complicity in eight murders […]