"Lao Farm Worker Beaten, Tied Up, in Dispute at Chinese Banana Plantation", 3 August 2020

A young Lao worker was beaten, shocked and tied up by his employers at a Chinese banana plantation in northwestern Laos in a dispute over working hours, his relatives said.

Lou Xiong’s relatives say he was beaten and shocked by Lao and Chinese employers at a Chinese banana plantation [...] .

[...] [T]he Phaly Company [...] denied they beat Lou Xiong and said he walked off the job during harvest season in violation of his contract.

[...]

Lou Xiong’s hands and feet with a rope and he was electrically shocked and beaten on the face, body, back, neck, legs and arms, his father wrote.

“He (the worker) was not beaten up; he was not beaten up that much, not as much as the father said in the video clip,” a representative from Phaly Company, the farm owner, told RFA.

“The worker breached the contract. This is the time of the year to harvest bananas, everybody should be working hard,” he said.

“The foreman said that he said he had a gun, so the foreman had no choice but to tie him up,” added the company representative, who said Lou Xiong became angry and threatened plantation personnel.

 Lou Xiong’s relatives, however, said he does not own a gun and did not have a weapon.

[...]