Right after the CEO said that working conditions were fine

May 25, 2010 15:08 GMT  ·  By

A recent string of stranger and stranger suicides recently got Foxconn a rather high amount of attention from the press. Until several days ago, ten people had fallen to their deaths from dorm windows at the company's factory in Shenzhen, one of which was found to had previously been stabbed with a knife several times. The wounds were subsequently discovered to have been self-inflicted. Coupled with a recent undercover story about Foxconn employees being supposedly overworked, rumors naturally emerged that it was the working environment, and long shifts, that pushed workers over the edge.

In order to attempt to bring the reaction of the media under control, Foxconn's Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Guo Tai-ming, came out today and publicly refuted the so-called rumors that the factory was a 'sweatshop.' He went on to say that it was difficult to keep track of the exact state of mind of all 800,000 employees.

While predictable, this public statement may have still had at least a small measure of credibility. Unfortunately, a rather morbidly ironic even took place just hours after this statement was made.

To be specific, the death count rose to 11 after a 19-year-old fell to his death from the Foxconn building.

There has not been enough time to establish whether or not it was a suicide. However, it is interesting to note that the victim had only been an employee of the factory for 42 days.

There is obviously nothing amusing about 11 young people from the same building dying in much the same way over a relatively short period of time and in uncannily similar ways. Currently, there has been no word on what, if any, measures the company executives plan to take in order to get to the bottom of this. Hopefully, an answer is found soon and no other fatalities occur.