Following 18 months of negotiations, the first-ever legislative regulation of private equity through a binding Directive was adopted by the European Parliament at the close of last year and will come into effect in 2013. What’s in it for workers?

Colombia leads the world in anti-union violence, accounting in 2009 for nearly half of the global count of murdered trade union members and leaders. A new report from the US Labor Education in the Americas Project (USLEAP) shows that judicial impunity continues and is worsening, nurturing and encouraging the violence.

The US AFL-CIO and the global union federation ICEM have joined the IUF in lodging a formal complaint against French-based sugar- and starchmaker Roquette Frères for violating the Guidelines on Multinational Enterprises of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

The Court of Appeal of Moldova has ordered the immediate release of the five union leaders from the Glodeni sugar plant workers' union who have been under house arrest for several weeks.

Australia’s National Union of Workers (NUW) is stepping up its campaign in support of workers at Baiada, the country’s largest poultry producer, by calling on the company’s main bank and largest retailer to insist that Baida guarantee ethical employment standards

In a morale boosting win for the IUF’s affiliate at the Pearl Continental Hotel in Karachi, Pakistan, union vice-president Nasreen Reshad won her case in the labour appellant court and has been reinstated with full benefits.

Nasreen was working at the health club of the Pearl Continental Hotel Karachi and was dismissed in 2002 together with other workers for fighting for her rights to union membership and bargaining rights.

Nearly 1200 Heinz workers will stop production at the food giant Heinz's flagship UK plant near Wigan just before 10pm (tonight) in protest at the lousy pay deal on offer from the vastly profitable company.

Five union leaders from the Glodeni sugar plant workers' union, Moldova, have been placed under house arrest to prevent them from trying to make sure their members get their wages and benefits.

The five - union chair Vasilii Guleac, vice chair Valentina Semeniuc and activists Anatolie Furtuna, Fiodor Svoevolin and Victor Colibaba – have been charged with criminal offences that could carry prisons sentences of between 3 and 8 years.