Riot leads to Foxconn factory closure

A brawl involving upwards of 2,000 workers has forced a unit at infamous Chinese manufacturing plant Foxconn to temporarily close.

Police were called in during the early hours of Monday morning to deal with the escalating situation The New York Times reports. Several people were hospitalised and a number arrested.

The plant in question is based in the central Chinese city of Taiyuan and employs around 79,000 workers.

It’s the latest in a long line of events that paint a troubled picture of slave-like working conditions and sky-high suicide rates that have characterised both the industrial rise of China and the boom in demand for consumer electronics not just in the West but across the developing world.

Indeed, such is our thirst for tech in the West that rather than focus on the appalling conditions that lead to such riots, the press immediately moved to find out whether or not the problems will disrupt production of the iPhone 5 – one of Foxconn’s key accounts.

Alas, the Foxconn spokesperson refused to reveal whether iPhone 5’s are being produced in the closed plant.