Elizabeth Grossman
Author of ‘Chasing Molecules’ and ‘High Tech Trash’

The Huffington Post

This is what we know happened. On March 31, 2010, Park Ji-Yeon, who worked at Samsung’s On-Yang semiconductor plant in South Korea, died of leukemia at age 23. According to Korean news accounts, Park began working at the Samsung plant in 2004 and was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia in 2007.

And it was in 2007 that a 22 year-old woman named Yu-mi Hwang who had worked at Samsung’s Gijeung semiconductor plant since just before graduating from high school died – also of leukemia. A year later, another woman who worked in the same plant in South Korea and shared a work bay with Yu-mi died, also of leukemia, at age 30.

There are now accounts from Korean news media, from SHARPS – an organization advocating for South Korean electronics workers – and from an international coalition of occupational health, safety, and workers’ rights organizations – that there are now over 20 documented cases of Samsung workers at On-yang, Giheung, and other plants in South Korea suffering from leukemia, lymphoma, and other cancers. Nine have died of such diseases, including a 30 year-old man who died of leukemia in 2004.Additional Samsung workers are known to be suffering from skin disorders, neuropathy, fertility problems including miscarriages, and chronic nosebleeds.

At Samsung, Park inspected semiconductor circuits – a job that involved using chemicals, high heat, and an x-ray machine. Yu-mi and her colleague also worked in semiconductor production as have other stricken Samsung workers.

On April 2, family and friends held a funeral service to honor Park Ji-Yeon in Seoul where she had gone for medical treatment. Following the ceremony her supporters held a press conference at Samsung headquarters. As was captured on video, shortly after the press conference began it was broken up by police who arrested and jailed seven activists – including an occupational health physician. They were released two days later without charges.

Doris Lee, of the Asia Monitor Resource Center tells me that rules governing public assemblies in South Korea have become increasingly restrictive and complex. Previously, she says, “a press conference would not have been dispersed, but now they are frequently vulnerable to being dispersed as illegal assemblies. This has even happened with funeral processions.”

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