In a decision on January 28, 2015 the Court of Cassation (France’s highest court) ruled that France’s labor jurisdiction was indeed appropriate and competent to hear the claims of 867 former employees of the Comilog company (Gabonese manganese mining company) for layoffs without notice or compensation, lodged on their behalf by the NGO Sherpa against the French companies Comilog France, Comilog International, and Comilog Holding. On several occasions the judges has allowed French employees to bring foreign companies before the French Labor Court within the jurisdiction where they normally carry out their work. In this situation however it is the employees who are carrying out their work in a different country that are allowed to bring French companies before the courts in their own French jurisdiction.
For over twenty years, the Congolese train workers (tasked with transporting manganese from the Gabon mine Moanda to Pointe-Noire in the Republic of Congo) are claiming compensation for unfair dismissal following a fatal train accident with a passenger train that resulted in the company relinquishing its use of trains to transport raw materials.
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