“Finally pay the victims”
The International Labour Organization (ILO) created the Rana Plaza Donors Trust Fund in order to pay for the medical costs and the loss of income for the victims of the Rana Plaza disaster and their families. Back in November 2014, the coordination committee said it would need 30 million dollars to cover for the 5,000 claims.
Brand and chains have waited a long time to contribute, which meant that two years after the disaster another 2.4 million dollars was needed to get to the 30 million dollar mark. An anonymous donor has now paid for that deficit.
“More than two years after the Rana Plaza collapse, we can finally pay the victims and their families. This is a major victory, but it has taken way too long”, Sara Ceustermans (part of the Flemish branch of CCC) said. “The fact that it has taken tremendous pressure to force brands and chains that have a joint 20 billion dollar profit every year to gather 30 million dollars, goes to show that the initiative to do business ethically cannot be handled by the fashion industry itself. Helping victims should be an obvious step, not something that only happens after pressure from the general public.”
The case is also finally advancing in a legal sense as 41 people, among whom the owner, were sent to court in early July. Over 1,100 people perished in the disaster.
