
Britain’s train drivers union ASLEF has written to the Colombian embassy in London following the murder of William Molina, general secretary of Colombia’s SINTRAL transport workers union, in the city of Cali on 5 November 2024.
William represented informal workers who had been conducting a campaign for recognition, which would bring improved conditions and employment rights, as well as demands for unpaid wages dating back as far as 15 years in some cases. Despite the advances made in Colombia through the 2016 peace agreement and the 2022 election of the country’s first pro-trade union government, William’s killing is a stark reminder that it remains the world’s deadliest country for organised labour.
ASLEF is a co-founding union of Justice for Colombia and its general secretary Mick Whelan is also the chair of JFC. Along with other ASLEF officials, he has visited Colombia on numerous occasions as part of JFC delegations to support human rights and peace in the country.
In the letter addressed to Ambassador Roy Barreras, dated 7 January 2025, ASLEF welcomed the progressive Petro government’s focus on improving worker rights and trade union security but said it was ‘alarmed that those who seek to weaken organised labour continue to attack workers’. ASLEF also reiterated calls by the CUT trade union federation, Colombia’s equivalent of the TUC, to carry out an ‘immediate and exhaustive investigation’ to hold William’s killers to account.
You can read or download the ASLEF letter below.