human rights Archives - Gethin Chamberlain

South Sudan

IMAGES
June 9, 2017

The grim truth of Chinese factories producing the West’s Christmas toys 0

INVESTIGATIONS
December 6, 2016

Investigation exposes low wages, hazardous chemicals and overtime beyond legal limits Gethin Chamberlain for The Observer, 4 December 2016 Xiao Fang thinks she’s one of the luckier workers making Barbie dolls for the Christmas market at the Mattel toy factory in Chang’an. True, she says, she works 11-hour days, six days a week, and shares

Where a baby girl is a mother’s awful shame 0

INDIA
October 4, 2009

Over the past 20 years in India, 10 million female babies have been aborted. The pressure to have sons is terrifying – mothers who bear daughters are beaten or cast aside by husbands and in-laws desperate to escape the financial burden of a girl’s dowry. Now mothers are being urged to ‘save the girl child’

Love is a battlefield: fighting back against honour killings.0

FEATURES
October 29, 2010

Gethin Chamberlain for The National, 29 October 2010 Aarti is stumbling across the fields, tears streaming down her face. Every now and again, she turns to look back over her shoulder, terrified that she is being followed. The man had shown her a gun, threatened her. She knew if they caught her that her life

Human safaris may be banned, but still tourists flock to Andaman Islands 0

ASIA, INDIA, NEWS, WORLD
September 1, 2012

Eight months after the Observer revealed the shocking story of how tourists were paying to gawp at reclusive tribe, Gethin Chamberlain returns to find the practice still goes on “Jarawa!” The cry goes up from the front of the bus and, in an instant, the tourists are on their feet, craning their necks to see

Suicide and suffering grip Europe’s nation of orphans 0

WORLD
March 25, 2007

Gethin Chamberlain, in Iasi, Romania, for The Sunday Telegraph, 25 March 2007 THE HEADMASTER glanced around the classroom. “Hands up, those of you with parents who are working abroad,” he told them. A forest of arms shot up; out of a class of 21 pupils at the school in Liteni in northern Romania, only three children

South Sudan 0

IMAGES
June 9, 2017

South Sudan became the world’s newest country in 2011 but within two years fighting had broken out between Dinka loyal to President Salva Kiir and members of the Nuer tribe, supporting former vice-president Riek Machar. A combination of violence and drought devastated last year’s harvests, creating food shortages that have left 100,000 people facing famine

Hell for leather: how low paid workers made Theresa May’s trousers 0

INVESTIGATIONS
December 18, 2016

Gethin Chamberlain, for the Sunday Mirror, 18 December 2016 Theresa May’s £995 leather trousers are made in a Turkish factory by workers paid as little as £1.49 an hour. The Prime Minister’s luxury Amanda Wakeley desert pants last week triggered a spat between No10 and former Tory Education Secretary Nicky Morgan. Ms Morgan was barred

Jordan’s perfume bottled by workers paid £2.05 per day 0

INVESTIGATIONS
June 13, 2010

Gethin Chamberlain, in Mumbai, for The Observer, 13 June 2010 Workers at a factory in India have been paid just 26p an hour to make perfume bottles for England World Cup sponsor Umbro and the glamour model Katie Price, better known as Jordan. An Observer investigation found that the 7,000 employees at the factory in Gujarat

South Sudan’s battle for cattle is forcing schoolgirls to become teenage brides 0

WORLD
June 8, 2017

Conflict and desperate hunger are driving families to marry off their daughters to secure precious cows, despite the girls having to forfeit their education Gethin Chamberlain for The Guardian, 8 June 2017 Down a red dirt road on the outskirts of Rumbek, a sprawling town at the heart of the world’s youngest country, a small

Myanmar’s new era dogged by ghosts of the old regime 0

WORLD
April 18, 2016

Aung San Suu Kyi’s election win saw the former political prisoner put in charge of Myanmar’s first civilian government since 1962 Gethin Chamberlain, for The Observer, 17 April 2016 “I want to be a soldier, to fight,” says 11-year-old Khin Soe Win, glancing round at the other children sitting in the gleaming new classroom. Another

How poverty wages for tea pickers fuel India’s trade in child slavery 1

INVESTIGATIONS
October 20, 2013

Millions of Brits drink a cup of Assam tea each day, but it comes at a terrible price. Plantation workers on 12p an hour are easy prey for traffickers who lure away their daughters to India’s cities. Now pressure is growing on big tea brands to safeguard better pay Gethin Chamberlain in Assam, for The

India targets the traffickers who sell children into slavery 0

IMAGES, INDIA, WORLD
August 5, 2012

Up to 200,000 children a year fall into the hands of slave traders in India, many sold by their poverty-stricken parents for as little as £11. Now a group of activists has set out to rescue them from a life in the sweatshops of Delhi Gethin Chamberlain in Katihar, India, for The Observer, 5 August

The human safari: the tribe that became a tourist attraction.0

WORLD
January 7, 2012

Jarawa people at risk from disease, predatory sex and exploitation as tourist convoys crowd the road through their jungle Gethin Chamberlain, for The Observer, 7 January 2012 “Dance,” the policeman instructed. The girls in front of him, naked from the waist up, obeyed. A tourist’s camera panned round to another young woman, also naked and

The race to rescue a slave: the real price of a cup of tea 0

INVESTIGATIONS
March 2, 2014

Gethin Chamberlain, for The Observer Magazine, 2 March 2014 A car, speeding through the crowded streets of Delhi. Inside, a phone is ringing. The voice on the line is that of a ghost, a girl who vanished into thin air three years ago. Somila was 16 when the traffickers lured her from the poverty of

That’s rich! Starbucks paying staff 25p an hour in new Indian cafes 0

INVESTIGATIONS
November 10, 2012

Tax row coffee chain pays ‘poverty wages’ despite making £222 million profit in three months Gethin Chamberlain, in Mumbai, for The Sunday Mirror, 10 November 2012 TAX row coffee chain Starbucks is paying workers just 25p an hour at its newly-opened stores in India. The pittance falls far below the country’s official living wage and

Six-year-old girl says other children wouldn’t play with her after she lost her leg – but now she’s been given hope 0

Video
June 11, 2016

Gethin Chamberlain, in Gaziantep, Turkey, for the Sunday Mirror, 11 June 2016 Four-year-old Shahd lay covered in dust when her mother found her. Her right leg was gone, taken off by the blast of a barrel bomb. Close by, her brother lay dead, his head smashed. A moment earlier they had been just another family

Crippled by uranium 0

IMAGES
August 30, 2009

Gethin Chamberlain, in Bathinda, India, for The Observer, Sunday 30 August 2009 Their heads are too large or too small, their limbs too short or too bent. For some, their brains never grew, speech never came and their lives are likely to be cut short: these are the children it appears that India would rather the

Burning Issue 0

INDIA
June 27, 2010

Despite years of robust economic growth, famine, insurgency and greed have pushed millions of people in India to the brink of starvation, especially in Jharkhand where famished children are ‘cured’ by branding Gethin Chamberlain in Mirgitand, India, for the South China Morning Post, 27 June 2010 The poker is glowing red hot, flames from a

Gap, Next and M&S in new sweatshop scandal 0

INVESTIGATIONS
August 8, 2010

Indian workers are paid just 25p an hour and forced to work overtime in factories used by some of Britain’s best-known high street stores Gethin Chamberlain for The Observer, 8 August 2010 Some of the biggest names on the British high street are at the centre of a major sweatshop scandal. An Observer investigation has

Child victims of the battle to end a bloody civil war 0

NEWS
May 25, 2009

Gethin Chamberlain, in Colombo, Sri Lanka. Special report for The Guardian, 25 May, 2009 Lying howling on a torn mattress, in a cot by a window overlooking the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo, the wounded toddler was a pitiful sight. A female relative fretted, trying to calm the girl down as the medics worked around her.

Admit it. You love cheap clothes. And you don’t care about child slave labour.4

COMMENT
July 28, 2013

Despite a series of revelations for the Observer about the brutal conditions in garment factories, companies, western consumers and India are still complicit in turning a blind eye Gethin Chamberlain, for The Observer, 28 July 2013 Until three years ago I did not believe in magic. But that was before I began investigating how western brands

Kanye West’s £150 Yeezy trainers are made by Chinese workers earning just £147 a MONTH 1

INVESTIGATIONS, NEWS
April 12, 2017

Apache Footwear staff are paid the equivalent of 85p an hour based on a five-day week to make the star’s Adidas trainers Gethin Chamberlain for The Daily Mirror, 12 April 2017 Factory workers making Kanye West ’s new Adidas trainers are paid just £147 a month, £3 less than the price of the £150 sneakers.

Corbyn’s sweatshop T-shirts: Poverty-stricken workers paid just 49p an hour 0

AMERICAS, INVESTIGATIONS, NEWS
September 13, 2015

* In Nicaragua, Corbyn T-shirt workers are paid £101 a month for shifts * ‘Team Corbyn’ garments sold out, raising £100,000 for his campaign * The T-shirts cost supporters £10 with the added postage cost of £3.50 * Corbyn spoke of his determination to combat poverty and inequality in an impassioned victory speech Gethin Chamberlain, for

Convert or die, Hindu lynch mobs tell fleeing Christians 0

INDIA
October 19, 2008

As a fresh wave of sectarian violence is unleashed across the Indian state of Orissa, Gethin Chamberlain talks to homeless survivors in Kandhamal district who were forced to abandon their religion Gethin Chamberlain, for The Observer, 19 October 2008 HUNDREDS of Christians in the Indian state of Orissa have been forced to renounce their religion

How can Lidl sell jeans for £5.99? Easy … pay people 23p an hour to make them 0

COMMENT
March 16, 2016

Gethin Chamberlain, for The Observer, 12 March 2016. Abracadabra! “Jean genie Lidl magics up £5.99 denims,” shouted the headline in a newspaper last weekend as it extolled the brilliance of the cut-price supermarket chain in once again undercutting its rivals. The German retailer, it explained, was continuing its assault on the traditional supermarket giants by targeting the

They wait, clutching cards they hope will be their ticket to escape this terrible place 0

WORLD
June 26, 2004

Gethin Chamberlain, on the Darfur border, for The Scotsman, 26 June 2004 THERE is a small boy, no more than six years old, clutching a rolled-up rug whose length is three times the height of his body. His arms are wrapped around the rug, the end of which sways backwards and forwards as he tries

Two million slum children die every year as India booms 0

INDIA
October 4, 2009

India’s growing status as an economic superpower is masking a failure to stem a shocking rate of infant deaths among its poorest people. Gethin Chamberlain in Delhi, for The Observer, 4 October 2009 Nearly two million children under five die every year in India – one every 15 seconds – the highest number anywhere in the world.

Building rights 0

INDIA
August 31, 2009

Gethin Chamberlain, in Kolkata, for The National, 31 August 2009 THE pregnancy came all too easily. Monica was 13, and the man in question was her overseer at the brick kiln where she worked about 40km north of the booming Indian mega-city of Kolkata. More than twice her age and married with two children of his

Revealed: Disney’s £35 Ariel doll earns a Chinese worker 1p 0

ASIA, INVESTIGATIONS, WORLD
December 7, 2018

An undercover investigation exposes illegally long working hours and low wages for staff at factory producing toys for Disney in China.

Disney factory faces probe into sweatshop suicide claims 0

INVESTIGATIONS
August 27, 2011

Gethin Chamberlain, for The Observer, 27 August 2011 DISNEY’S best-selling Cars toys are being made in a factory in China that uses child labour and forces staff to do three times the amount of overtime allowed by law, according to an investigation. One worker reportedly killed herself after being repeatedly shouted at by bosses. Others cited

Exclusive: Schoolchildren in China work overnight to produce Amazon Alexa devices 0

ASIA, INVESTIGATIONS, NEWS, WORLD
August 10, 2019

Leaked documents show children as young as 16 recruited by Amazon supplier Foxconn work gruelling and illegal hours

How high street clothes were made by children in Myanmar for 13p an hour 0

INVESTIGATIONS
February 6, 2017

Children of 14 were working a six-day week Gethin Chamberlain for The Observer, 5 February 2017 Children as young as 14 have been employed to make clothes for some of the most popular names on the UK high street, according to a new report. New Look, Sports Direct’s Lonsdale brand and H&M have all used

Apple’s Chinese workers treated ‘inhumanely, like machines’0

INVESTIGATIONS
May 1, 2011

Gethin Chamberlain, for The Observer, 1 May 2011 An investigation into the conditions of Chinese workers has revealed the shocking human cost of producing the must-have Apple iPhones and iPads that are now ubiquitous in the west. The research, carried out by two NGOs, has revealed disturbing allegations of excessive working hours and draconian workplace

Inside the Indian factory where workers churn out £200 handbags sported by Pippa Middleton for just 17p an hour 0

INVESTIGATIONS
January 19, 2013

Gethin Chamberlain, in Chennai, for The Mail on Sunday, 19 January 2013 IT is marketed as the very best of British, a handbag that has become the season’s must-have accessory after capturing the heart of Pippa Middleton. But what Modalu London’s thousands of admirers may not realise is that their favourite brand has hired a

One family’s anguish amid India’s child abduction epidemic 0

WORLD
July 5, 2011

Gethin Chamberlain for The National, 5 July 2011 It happens all of a sudden. One moment Anil Lakhotia is talking, the next his face is buried in his hands and his shoulders are shaking. Life goes on around him in a small cafe down a side street in the city across the river from Kolkata:

‘They’re killing us’: world’s most endangered tribe cries for help 0

INVESTIGATIONS
April 22, 2012

Logging companies keen to exploit Brazil’s rainforest have been accused by human rights organisations of using gunmen to wipe out the Awá, a tribe of just 355. Survival International, with backing from Colin Firth, is campaigning to stop what a judge referred to as ‘genocide’ Gethin Chamberlain, for The Observer, 22 April 2012 Trundling along

Family’s tragic tale is a reality for millions as South Sudan is gripped by famine and civil war 0

AFRICA, FEATURES, South Sudan, WORLD
June 24, 2017

The Sunday People travels to the heart of the stricken country with British charity Plan International UK and meets Chagai and her family who, like many others, face starvation Gethin Chamberlain, for The Sunday People, 24 June 2017 Baby Nyandiar’s eyes are full of hope but it is clear, even at first glance, that she

The Red Brigade: the women of India fight back 0

MAGAZINES
April 6, 2013

Gethin Chamberlain, in Lucknow, India, for The National, 6 April 2013 THE young women stride out along the dusty street that cuts through the Madiyav slum. Their bright red uniforms glow in the late afternoon sun and there is no mistaking their air of confidence. Since the gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old student

Hey Alexa: does Amazon use underpaid and exhausted workers to make its Echo and Kindle?0

ASIA, INVESTIGATIONS, WORLD
June 9, 2018

In the Chinese city of Hengyang, we find a fatigued, disposable workforce assembling gadgets for Amazon, owned by the world’s richest man. by Gethin Chamberlain in Hengyang, China, 9 Jun 2018 Five o’clock in the morning and the young woman’s eyelids are drooping. All night she has been removing spots of dust from Amazon smartspeakers with a toothbrush. Time

Why climate change is creating a new generation of child brides 0

INVESTIGATIONS
November 28, 2017

As global warming exacerbates drought and floods, farmers’ incomes plunge and girls as young as 13 are given away to stave off poverty Gethin Chamberlain for The Observer, 26 November 2017 It was the flood that ensured that Ntonya’s first year as a teenager would also be the first year of her married life. Up

A nation adrift 0

FEATURES
September 19, 2010

The National, 19 September 2010 The floods that continue to submerge swathes of Pakistan have marooned hundreds of thousands of people on small islands of high ground. Gethin Chamberlain accompanies a rescue mission in Sindh province. THERE is a small boy, standing up to his waist in the flood water, staring at the boats that have pulled

Workers who are making Katy Perry eyelashes for 8p a pair 0

INVESTIGATIONS
October 20, 2013

Gethin Chamberlain for The Sun on Sunday, 20 October 2013 THEY are this year’s must-have fashion accessory, but an investigation by The Sun on Sunday has lifted the lid on the false eyelash business – where women in Indonesia work for as little as 20P A DAY. The lashes are manufactured for Western companies then

“Even the stones were destroyed”0

NEWS
June 15, 2004

Gethin Chamberlain, on the Darfur border, for The Scotsman, 15 June 2004 HALAWA’S body lay on the mountainside where she fell when the bombs exploded, her womb torn open, the tiny body of her unborn baby lying by her side, the blood soaking into the soil congealing in the heat of the sun. She was

Russell Brand’s trendy tops made in Bangladesh 0

ASIA, INVESTIGATIONS, WORLD
June 6, 2015

Gethin Chamberlain for the Daily Mail with Lucy Osborne and Ian Drury, 5 June 2015 Millionaire comic sells £60 sweatshirts from workers earning just 25p an hour Comic claims sweatshirts are ‘screen printed and produced in the UK’ In fact label stitched into lining reveals they are made in Bangladesh Factory staff described working 11-hour shifts

Were Kate’s favourite dresses made in 6p an hour sweatshop?0

INVESTIGATIONS
July 17, 2011

Bangladeshi workers claim they are slaves to make dresses for brand favoured by Kate and Pippa Middleton Gethin Chamberlain, for The Sunday People, 17 July 2011 THE harrowing human cost of clothes that workers claim are made for one of Kate Middleton’s favourite high street shops is today exposed by The People. In an investigation

No food, no money: conflict and chaos as South Sudan grapples with famine 0

WORLD
June 15, 2017

The rains are now falling, but on a country where people cannot work their fields because of fighting and where food prices are escalating beyond their reach Gethin Chamberlain for The Guardian, 15 July 2017 The tape measure wound around the arm of two-year old Apiu tells its own story. Under the traffic light system

Shallow grave is testimony to Sudan’s lies 0

NEWS
August 4, 2004

Gethin Chamberlain, In Nami, North Darfur, for The Scotsman, 4 August 2004 THE grave is just a mound of earth, no more than two feet high at its peak and 10ft in diameter. It lies about 50 yards from the edge of the village of Nami in North Darfur. From the thorn tree a few

Olympic brands caught up in abuse scandal 0

INVESTIGATIONS
March 3, 2012

While Adidas, Nike and Puma make millions out of the Games, their employees are claiming exploitation Gethin Chamberlain, for The Observer, 3 March 2012 Workers producing sportswear for Olympic sponsors Adidas, Nike and Puma are beaten, verbally abused, underpaid and overworked in Bangladeshi sweatshops, a shocking investigation has discovered. Workers for all three companies had been

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human rights

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