Natural Fruit takes UK activist to court
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The vice president of canned-pineapple and juice-concentrate producer Natural Fruit yesterday maintained the company had suffered Bt300 million in lost orders since British human-rights defender and labour activist Andy Hall this year accused the firm of
Hall alleged that the company had engaged in the hiring of child labour, paid less than the minimum wage and physically abused workers, among other violations.
Kachin Komneryawanich insisted none of the allegations was true and said the firm’s legal representatives had filed both libel and criminal charges under the Computer Crimes Act against Hall. The Criminal Court conducted a preliminary examination of the charges yesterday.
Natural Fruit is seeking Bt300 million in damages and Hall, if found guilty, could be jailed for up to seven years.
Meanwhile, Helsinki-based human-rights monitor Finnwatch, which jointly conducted research into Natural Fruit with Hall, issued a statement yesterday calling the legal move against him “an attack” against a human-rights defender and freedom of expression.
The statement claimed that the workers, some of whom it said were undocumented migrants, “reported poor working conditions, unlawfully low wages, confiscation of official documents, use of child labour and excessive overtime”.
Finnwatch added in its statement that interviews with employees had been recorded and could be verified.
As neither Hall nor any of his legal representatives was present at the Criminal Court yesterday,
the court told the plaintiff’s lawyer, Somsak Torugsa, to check with the Immigration Office as to whether Hall was still in the Kingdom.
If Hall, a former researcher at Mahidol University, had left Thailand, then a court notification would be sent to his home address in the United Kingdom, said Somsak.
He called on Hall to show up and fight the case to prove his innocence, adding that Natural Fruit is ready to negotiate.
“If you are really innocent, then face the judicial process and things will be over. If you want to negotiate, do contact us,” he said.
Kachin, meanwhile, acknowledged that the latest statement could negatively affect the company, which is Thailand’s 12th- or 13th-largest tinned-pineapple exporter.
He refused to speculate why Hall had made such serious allegations against the company.
