Factory that supplied Tesco compensated abused worker

The woman was robbed and told if she protested she would be ‘killed and put in box’

A Bangladeshi factory that produces clothes for Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Mothercare was forced to compensate an “outspoken” female worker after she was beaten up on the orders of management and threatened with being murdered, the Guardian has learned.

The woman claimed to have been “severely beaten up” by security guards and the HR and compliance management at the factory, which is used by the brand Stanley/Stella. She said she was robbed of her severance pay and told that if she protested she would be “killed and her body put in a cardboard box”, an industry watchdog report that endorses her account states.

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Revealed: Spice Girls T-shirts made in factory paying staff 35p an hour

Workers producing tops sold to raise money for Comic Relief receive far below a living wage

Spice Girls T-shirts sold to raise money for Comic Relief’s “gender justice” campaign were made at a factory in Bangladesh where women earn the equivalent of 35p an hour during shifts in which they claim to be verbally abused and harassed, a Guardian investigation has found.

The charity tops, bearing the message “#IWannaBeASpiceGirl”, were produced by mostly female machinists who said they were forced to work up to 16 hours a day and called “daughters of prostitutes” by managers for not hitting targets.

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‘Inhuman conditions’: life in factory making Spice Girls T-shirts

Staff at Bangladesh plant tell of fainting and abuse while sewing charity tops designed by group

Salma has never even heard of the Spice Girls. Her life, hunched over a sewing machine for up to 16 hours a day, is a world away from the luxuries enjoyed by the millionaire pop band.

But while neither knows it, Salma and the Spice Girls are connected. The factory where she has worked for more than five years, off a narrow, winding road three hours’ drive from Dhaka, is where charity T-shirts designed by the group were made.

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Bangladesh strikes: thousands of garment workers clash with police over poor pay

Dozens of factories have closed after more than a week of protests in which one person has died

Thousands of garment workers in Bangladesh who make clothes for top global brands have clashed with police as strike action over low wages entered a second week.

Police said water cannon and tear gas were fired on Sunday to disperse huge crowds of striking factory workers in Savar, a garment hub just outside the capital, Dhaka.

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Plight of Rohingya a ‘human rights nightmare’

A child is seen behind a barbed wire fence in 'no man's land' at the Myanmar and Bangladesh border UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said he heard "unimaginable" accounts of atrocities during a visit to vast camps in Bangladesh that are home to a million Rohingya refugees who fled violence in Myanmar. Mr Guterres described the situation for the persecuted Muslim minority as "a humanitarian and human rights nightmare", as he prepared to tour makeshift shelters crammed with people who escaped a Myanmar army operation last year that the UN has likened to ethnic cleansing.

Myanmar military assures U.N. of ‘harsh’ action on sexual assault

Myanmar's military has assured the United Nations of "harsh" action against perpetrators of sexual violence, state media reported on Tuesday, as U.N. envoys traveled to Rakhine State where the military conducted a widely criticized crackdown. Rohingya refugees are reflected in rain water along an embankment next to paddy fields after fleeing from Myanmar into Palang Khali, near Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh November 2, 2017.

US Ambassador at Large arrives Wednesday

Republican Governor Sam Brownback of Kansas, speaks during the Conservative Political Action Conference in National Harbor, Maryland, US, February 23, 2017. Photo: Reuters Ambassador at Large for International Religious Freedom of the United States Sam Brownback arrives here on Wednesday on a two-day official visit to discuss religious freedom with government officials, civil society representatives and others concerned.

‘We will not go’: Rohingya fear repatriation to Myanmar

Traveling at speed in a ramshackle truck, a group of 44 Rohingya refugees make the last stage of their harrowing 10-day journey into Bangladesh after fleeing from Myanmar. Dazed and exhausted, they stumble out of the vehicle when they arrive at Balukhali refugee camp in Cox's Bazar, many of them cradling young children.

UN urges rethink of Rohingya repatriations without safeguards

Rohingya refugees build shelter with bamboo at the Jamtoli camp in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, in the morning on January 22, 2018. Photo: Reuters/Mohammad Ponir Hossain The UN refugee agency and other groups have urged a rethink of the plan to send Rohingya refugees back to Myanmar amid fears of forced repatriations and the inability of aid agencies to ensure the safety of hundreds of thousands who fled bloodshed at home.

Hindu refugees eagerly await return to Myanmar

Hindu farmer Surodhon Pal has packed his bags, eager to return to Myanmar after fleeing for Bangladesh during a wave of violence last year, but he is in a tiny minority - most of the refugees are terrified of going home. Bangladesh wants the more than 655,000 refugees who have flooded into the country since late August to start returning to Myanmar by the end of this month under a controversial agreement between the two nations.

Insurgents: Rohingya Have No Option But to Fight ‘Burmese Terrorism’

Rohingya Muslim insurgents said Sunday they have no choice but to fight what they called Myanmar state-sponsored terrorism to defend the Rohingya community, and they demanded that the Rohingya be consulted on all decisions affecting their future. The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army launched raids on the Myanmar security forces Aug. 25, which sparked sweeping counter-insurgency operations in the Muslim-majority north of Rakhine State that led to widespread violence and arson and an exodus of some 650,000 Rohingya villagers to Bangladesh.

Nearly 50,000 Rohingya babies expected in 2018, with no repatriation plan in sight

A malnourished Rohingya Muslim refugee boy cries as mothers feed high calorie peanut paste to their malnourished children at a field clinic. Myanmar is officially on the State Department's list of countries that violate religious freedoms , as hundreds of thousands of Rohingya continue to struggle for survival in over-crowded refugee camps, with their numbers about to swell by nearly 50,000.

Indian state tense ahead of citizens list targeting ‘illegal Bangladeshis’

GUWAHATI, India/NEW DELHI: India has mobilised around 60,000 police and paramilitary troops in a sensitive border state ahead of the publication of a list of citizens it says will be used to detect and deport illegal immigrants: mainly Muslims: from neighbouring Bangladesh. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party took power in the eastern state of Assam for the first time last year, vowing to act against illegal Muslim residents who take away jobs from local Hindus.

Pope arrives in Bangladesh in shadow of Rohingya crisis

Pope Francis landed in Bangladesh on Thursday after a diplomatically sensitive trip to mainly Buddhist Myanmar, where he made no direct reference to the plight of Rohingya Muslims who have fled to Bangladesh in their hundreds of thousands. Pope Francis walks with Bangladesh's President Abdul Hamid after arriving at the airport in Dhaka, Bangladesh November 30, 2017.

Vatican defends Pope’s avoidance of word Rohingya on historic Myanmar visit

The Vatican is pushing back against criticism aimed at Pope Francis for not speaking out against Myanmar's treatment of the Rohingya Muslims during his historic visit to the southeast Asian country. Foreign diplomats, including US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, have called what Myanmar's military is doing to the Rohingya ethnic cleansing, a charge that its leadership and the country's defacto ruler Aung San Suu Kyi deny.