More than 1,000 members of Mexico's National Union of Mine, Metal, and Steelworkers have been on strike at the Cananea copper mine in Northern Mexico since July 30, 2007, protesting health and safety and other contract violations.

On February 11, 2010, a panel of the Mexican Supreme Court gave permission to the employer, Grupo Mexico, to fire the strikers. According to Mexican labor experts, this decision effectively eliminates the right to strike in Mexico.

Weakening Mexican labor protections and attacking democratic unions will keep wages low in Mexico, creating incentive for more U.S. plants to move to low-wage, highly exploitative Mexican facilities and forcing more Mexican workers to migrate to the United States.

In a statement issued in response to the court decision, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said:

We condemn the threats of the Mexican government to repress the democratic and independent union movement in this and other current cases. Such attacks on the trade union movement thoroughly undercut the promise made years ago to U.S., Mexican and Canadian workers under the NAALC [the NAFTA labor side agreement] that fundamental worker rights would be fully respected in North America.

On March 3, the AFL-CIO Executive Council issued a statement in solidarity with the Cananea strikers. The statement calls on Congress and the Obama administration to publicly condemn the violations of worker rights in Mexico and pledges the moral and material support of the AFL-CIO and its members to the striking workers at Cananea and their families.