Hong Kong owner of Pacific island casino sued over forced labour, trafficking claims

Imperial Pacific International Holdings

15/03/2019 24:00

By Farah Master
    HONG KONG, March 15 (Reuters) - Hong Kong-listed Imperial
Pacific  1076.HK , the owner of a multi-billion Saipan gaming
project, is being sued by former construction workers who say
they were victims of forced labour and human trafficking on the
U.S.-administered Pacific island.
    Seven Chinese construction workers made the claim via a
filing on Friday to the Federal Court in Saipan, part of the
Northern Mariana Islands. 
    They are seeking unspecified monetary compensation for pain
and suffering as well as punitive damages.    
    Imperial Pacific did not respond to a request for comment.
    The lush mountainous island of Saipan, controlled by the
United States since the end of World War Two, approved a casino
in 2014, after which Chinese investment skyrocketed.
    Imperial Pacific has the sole licence to operate a casino in
Saipan but has faced a slew of delays and setbacks to open its
hotel resort. 
    Scrutiny of the project intensified after the death of a
construction worker in 2017 and an FBI raid that found a list of
more than 150 undocumented workers in a contractor’s offices, as
well as a safe containing several thousand dollars in U.S.
currency, several hundred Chinese yuan and employee pay stubs.
    Several executives have resigned over the past year and
worker protests have been a recurring theme as they claim unpaid
wages and injuries.
    The filing, which names Imperial Pacific as well as its
contractors, MCC International Saipan Ltd and Gold Mantis
Construction Decoration, alleges workers were required to work
more than 12 hours a day and sometimes do a 24-hour shift. 
    It also accuses employers of withholding a portion of their
wages and claims they often failed to pay them for weeks at a
time.
    MCC, which is owned by Metallurgical Corp of China, and Gold
Mantis, a subsidiary of Suzhou Gold Mantis Construction
Decoration, did not immediately respond to a request for
comment. 
    The filing states Imperial Pacific knew about, or at a
minimum, "recklessly disregarded its contractors' exploitive and
illegal practices" and that the company was repeatedly told
about the use of unauthorised workers on the construction site. 
    Crammed into dormitories, often with no showers or
air-conditioning, plaintiffs were made to work on a construction
site that was extremely dangerous, it said.  
    "One Gold Mantis supervisor, who had already physically
beaten another employee, threatened to kill plaintiffs if they
disobeyed him," it said in the filing.  
    All plaintiffs suffered injuries including a badly burnt
leg, scalded hand and partially severed finger, according to the
filing.
    Saipan's casino commission has extended the deadline for the
completion of the resort to February 2021. Imperial Pacific was
contractually obliged to open the casino in March 2017.  

 (Reporting by Farah Master; Editing by Nick Macfie)
 ((farah.master@thomsonreuters.com; +852 28431631 ; Reuters
Messaging: farah.master.thomsonreuters@thomsonreuters.net))