Alao accepted the AFT Bayard Rustin Human Rights Award on behalf of the Amel Centre during the convention’s Human Rights Award luncheon. Alao, who previously had fled southern Sudan, told luncheon attendees that the center has documented hundreds of cases of gross human rights violations and has filed complaints with local and national authorities.

AFT president Edward J. McElroy said the Amel Centre and its staff are exhibiting “the kind of idealism and determination that were the hallmarks” of the life of civil and human rights activist Bayard Rustin.

One of the reasons the AFT chose to recognize the Amel Centre, he explained, was “to help keep the world focused on the suffering in this region and spur greater action to bring relief and justice to the victims, and end this conflict.”

Han Dongfang brings hope
Some of the best lessons in democracy at AFT conventions come from the inspiring stories of international activists. Han Dongfang, a Chinese labor activist who rose to prominence through the events of Tiananmen Square in 1989, spoke of what motivated him to take the stand that ended with his imprisonment, and which still motivates Chinese workers today.

Han, the son of peasants, was living near Tiananmen Square in 1989. He quickly got caught up in the student democracy movement. That spring, he founded the Beijing Autonomous Workers Federation, the first independent labor organization in China in 50 years. It was shut down when the Tiananmen Square demonstrations came to a bloody end June 4.

Han was arrested and spent 22 months in prison; he contracted tuberculosis there and, near death, was released. Today, he lives in Hong Kong where he hosts a labor call-in program broadcast to China on Radio Free Asia.

Han’s program, “China Labor Bulletin,” publicizes the plight of millions of migrant laborers who work in factories, make 5 cents an hour, are sometimes not paid until the end of the year and then may be paid at 70 percent of the rate promised. The program has helped get legal assistance to workers in China who are appealing their sentences.

“Yes, we are being heavily exploited,” Han reported. “Yes, when we organize a union, people are sent to prison. We are sad. But the trade union movement does not believe in tears, we believe in solidarity.”