Rana Plaza Collapse (huge life losses)

[CaPtAiN_pLaNeT]

UN chief, Indian parliament, French FM mourn deaths in building collapse
→ Staff Correspondent

daily sun | First Page | UN chief, Indian parliament, French FM mourn deaths in building collapse

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Indian Parliament and the French government expressed deepest condolences over the loss of lives in Savar tragedy

A statement by the spokesperson for the Secretary-General on Friday said, “The Secretary-General is deeply saddened by the loss of life and injuries caused by the collapse of a garment factory in the outskirts of the capital, Dhaka, earlier this week.”

“He extends his sincere condolences to the Government and people of Bangladesh. He expresses his deepest sympathies to those who have lost loved ones or have been otherwise affected by this tragedy.”

“The United Nations stands ready to provide any assistance that may be needed, the statement added.”

Meanwhile, Indian parliament (Lok Sabha) condoled the loss of lives in Savar Tragedy.

Meira Kumar, Speaker of the Lok Sabha, addressed the members at the opening of the day’s session on Friday and said, “It’s with great sorrow that we have learnt of the collapse of a multi-storey building in Savar, Bangladesh on April 24 leading to the loss of many lives and causing injuries to several others.”

The Lok Sabha Speaker conveyed her heartfelt sympathy and expressed condolence to the bereaved families who lost their near and dear ones in this tragic accident. “We extend our solidarity to the people of Bangladesh in their hour of grief.”

The members then stood in silence for a while, a release of the Indian High Commission in Dhaka said on Saturday.

Besides, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius has condoled the loss of lives in Savar building collapse, as saying, “We are deeply saddened to learn the heavy loss of lives.”

In a letter to his Bangladesh counterpart Dr Dipu Moni, the French FM extended deepest condolences to the bereaved families and sympathy to the people of Bangladesh.

 

[Controlled Pair]

Terrible. It's been on the news a lot in the UK.

What's Bangladesh's search and rescue infrastructure like? can it cope? I have not heard of any international teams going to help, which is strange.

 

[Anubis]

Terrible. It's been on the news a lot in the UK.

What's Bangladesh's search and rescue infrastructure like? can it cope? I have not heard of any international teams going to help, which is strange.

They have rescued around 2,500 people.Around 350 dead bodies have been recovered.They will be switching to using heavy equipments to drill holes to see if they can find anymore survivors or dead bodies.They are working round the clock and volunteers are helping both with manual labour and equipments.

 

[Skallagrim]

Total 373 deadbodies recovered.


Rana arrested by RAB from Benapole.

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[Skallagrim]

US Embassy donates blood for Savar victims

Senior Correspondent, bdnews24.com Published: 2013-04-28 14:24:09.0 Updated: 2013-04-28 14:24:09.0

US Ambassador in Dhaka Dan Mozena along with his embassy colleagues donated blood on Sunday to help the Savar victims. According to the Embassy’s Facebook page, they donated blood at the ICDDR,B in Dhaka. An official who was present there told bdnews24.com that at least 15 employees including the Ambassador who have ‘rare’ negative blood type made the donation. “You don’t have to be a doctor to save a life… Donate blood – it’s safe, it’s simple, and it saves lives!” the Facebook page reads. “Today, Ambassador Mozena and U.S. Embassy Dhaka employees donated their blood at ICDDR,B for the victims of the Savar tragedy. You, too, can help, especially if you have a negative blood type! Please check with your local hospital to find out where you can donate,” read the Facebook page. Organisations who collect blood regularly say they ‘rarely’ get negative type blood in any campaign. “It (negative) is about 5 percent of our total collection,” says a volunteer with Sandhani, a medical students’ organisation. An ICDDR,B official says they will supply the blood to those who need it. Rescuers so far retrieved nearly 400 bodies from the Wednesday’s nine-story collapsed building in Dhaka suburb of Savar, worst in the country’s history. img More than 1000 were injured while many more remained still missing. Soon after the collapse, different organisations collected blood and sent it to the hospitals where patients were admitted. People also rushed to the hospitals when media cried for blood on the first day. RAB nabbed the owner of the building Mohammad Sohel Rana, a local ruling Awami League’s youth front Juba League leader, on Sunday.


US Embassy donates blood for Savar victims - bdnews24.com

 

[EyelessInGaza]

Heart breaking. RIP to the dead.

 

[idune]

....Guess who had assisted him to Benapole from Savar.

Why Sohel Rana's godfather MP Murad Jong and his godmather still at large? These are all farcical show just to deceive people. That is why Awami League genocidal regime and their cheer leaders using tragedy as shield.

 

[Zabaniyah]

That sub-human was fleeing to India?

A few days back, Hasina stated that sub-human had nothing to do with Jubo League:

The prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, on Thursday told parliament that Sohel Rana, the owner of Rana Plaza that collapsed on Wednesday leaving over 200 killed, was not a leader of Awami Jubo League, the Awami League-backed youth organisation.

Rana is not a Juba League leader: PM

And here's an eye candy from our beloved Daily Star:

The photo taken on Victory Day, 2012, shows Sohel Rana, the owner of Rana Plaza, on an SUV of a motor procession of Jubo League, the youth front of ruling Awami League. On Thursday, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina told parliament that she had seen the list of Savar Jubo League office bearers and Sohel Rana was not on the list. Photo: Banglar Chokh

2 factory owners arrested | The Daily Star

 

[SpArK]

Dhaka building owner arrested on India border, toll 397 - The Times of India

 

[PlanetSoldier]

That sub-human was fleeing to India?

A few days back, Hasina stated that sub-human had nothing to do with Jubo League:

Rana is not a Juba League leader: PM

And here's an eye candy from our beloved Daily Star:

2 factory owners arrested | The Daily Star

I checked the minister list of BD, there's no Sheikh Hasina in the list. Oh thukku...to lie I've to stand inside parliament and start vomiting !

 

[idune]

Dhaka building owner arrested on India border, toll 397 - The Times of India

Feeling the heat Awami League must have requested india to return him at the border. How else he was found convinently at border crossing in such public place?

 

[jaunty]

304 Dead in Building Collapse, Bangladesh - The Big Picture - Boston.com

 

[PlanetSoldier]

Pope Francis urges prayer for Savar victims

News Desk, bdnews24.com

Published: 2013-04-28 15:27:27.0 Updated: 2013-04-28 17:04:55.0

Pope Francis has called for prayers for the victims of the Savar tragedy.


“Join me in praying for the victims of the tragedy in Dhaka, Bangladesh, that God will grant comfort and strength to their families,” the new leader of the Roman Catholic Church tweeted on Saturday, according to The Vatican Today newspaper.

Nine-storey commercial building Rana Plaza collapsed near Savar Bus Stand on Wednesday morning, a day after cracks appeared on its wall. At least 377 people were killed and several hundreds injured in what is described as the worst such incident of the country.

Relentless efforts are on to salvage those still alive inside the rubbles of the building.

The building was erected over 56 decimals of land. Now only three stories are standing above the ground. The building housed five garment units, a bank branch, and shops of electronics, computers, cosmetics and clothes.

Pope Francis urges prayer for Savar victims - bdnews24.com

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It's really appreciable, people around the world are with us.

 

[Skallagrim]

The latest figure of death is 397.

At 10:05 pm rescue workers tried to bring out a surviving female worker through a tunnel. They progressed halfway with the woman- suddenly there was a fire and 4 workers got injured, keeping her there they came out immediately, firefighters put out the fire, rescue group again crawled into the tunnel but couldn't bring the woman out alive.

This along with other such incidents perhaps has made the whole tragedy more tragic.

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[PlanetSoldier]

Bangladesh factory collapse: Who really pays for our cheap clothes?
By Anna McMullen, special for CNN
April 26, 2013 -- Updated 1524 GMT (2324 HKT)


Editor's note: Anna McMullen is a campaigner for Labour Behind the Label which calls itself a group "that supports garment workers' efforts worldwide to improve their working conditions." She works with global partners on campaigns around poverty wages in the fashion industry, and has co-authored research reports on labor rights. Follow @labourlabel on Twitter.

(CNN) -- The sad fact behind the building collapse in Bangladesh in which hundreds died is that it isn't an isolated problem. The story will leave the headlines at the end of this week but on Monday hundreds of thousands of workers will return to factories that are frankly further tragedies waiting to happen, and will keep producing clothes for high street brands.

Seven hundred workers have died in factory collapses and fires in this very small region outside Dhaka alone in the last decade.

Savar, where the building collapse took place, is a swampland (yes, swampland...) north of the Bangladeshi capital which has seen mass growth in recent years.

This same region was the site of a horrific factory fire in November last year, when 112 workers burned alive in a building with no fire exits.

Hundreds of factories are being thrown up in a short space of time, with limited building regulations, to meet the growing demand from western brands for cheap export clothing. And it is cheap. Wages for Bangladeshi workers are the lowest in Asia, aside from the recently opened Myanmar industry, at $37 a month.

As the demand for cheap clothing grows in the west, brands continue to look for ways to race to the bottom on prices, and sadly this involves cutting corners on health and safety. Brands will by no means admit to this.

The prices that they pay, they assure us, are enough to pay workers enough to live on and keep factories in tip top condition. But, faced with constantly decreasing incomes, factory owners inevitably let things slide, like replacing faulty machinery or fixing worrying building subsidence...


When garment factories were still mainly based in retail countries, consumers knew people who held jobs in factories, and had a personal connection with those who had been injured or put at risk in the workplace.

But with globalization has come consumer apathy. Who cares about people who make clothing? As long as it is cheap we will buy it.

Especially in a recession, cheap clothing is a welcome industry for many. People in western countries living on the poverty line need to buy clothes for their children.

Jobs in Bangladesh are also vital for a country where hundreds of thousands of people live below the poverty line. It isn't the responsibility of the consumer to feel guilty about buying what is readily available in shops.

Business must stop just holding up its hands to say: "It is not our fault -- they bought it." The responsibility for ensuring that a product was made with human rights in mind has to fall somewhere, and the United Nations guiding principles on business and human rights says that it falls jointly to states and mass corporate businesses to "protect, respect and remedy" human rights.


In short, the brands, not the consumer, are the ones who must take responsibility for the endemic problems that this industry faces.

So what can be done? Many western brands rely on audits and in-house checks to monitor whether conditions in their factories are up to scratch. In a country where a little hand shake and a small exchange of money gets the job done, this process often fails to give an accurate picture of factory conditions, building and fire safety.

It is common for fire extinguishers to be borrowed for inspection day, for workers to be schooled in what answers they have to give when asked questions.


The Clean Clothes Campaign together with local and global unions and labor rights organizations, has developed a program that hopes to solve this. The Bangladesh Building and Fire Safety Agreement is a proposal for a sector-wide initiative that includes independent building inspections, worker rights training, public disclosure and a long-overdue review of safety standards.

The crucial element of this is that unions and worker led committees take a central role in monitoring and reporting back on improvements that need to be made, in a public way.

This transparent and practical agreement is unique in that it is supported by all key labor stakeholders in Bangladesh and internationally. So far, U.S. company PVH, owner of Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger, and German retailer Tchibo have signed up to the program, but it needs a critical mass of brand support to be implemented.

Joint memorandam of understanding on fire and building safety:

Labour Behind the Label and others are calling on all brands sourcing from Bangladesh to publicly sign up to take part in the building and fire safety scheme to make transparent, worker-led improvements to the industry.

In the wake of tragedies such as yesterday's building collapse, the Tazreen fire in November, and the nearby Spectrum factory collapse some years ago, something must be done to make a change. This proposal is the best on the table by far.

How many more deaths will it take to move brands from making CSR statements of regret, to investing in a sustainable and safe industry? We hope none.

Bangladesh collapse: What cost cheap clothes? - CNN.com