It was a factory under construction. While, sure, the law is ambiguous (which is the whole point of having "norms" like this in the first place), surely you'd agree that their work falls under "persons installing, servicing and repairing commercial or industrial equipment or machinery pursuant to a contract of sale."

I just can't understand how anyone thinks that a "Surprise! You're in jail now!" change of enforcement norms like this is a good thing.

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gruez 2 days ago | parent [-]

>It was a factory under construction. [...] surely you'd agree that their work falls under "persons installing, servicing and repairing commercial or industrial equipment or machinery pursuant to a contract of sale."

I can't tell whether you actually think the factory was under construction and therefore the exemption you mentioned would apply, or are trying to mislead people with some sneaky wording (ie. that it was under construction at some point). In any case according to wikipedia[1] it was constructed between 2022-2024, and "full production" (of cars, presumably) began in October 2024, almost a year ago. By all accounts it wasn't "under construction".

That said, I'm sure that something as complicated as a car factory would be continually upgraded and repaired, and maybe some of that would fall under "installing, servicing and repairing commercial or industrial equipment or machinery pursuant to a contract of sale", but at the same time that shouldn't be used as an excuse for multinationals to import arbitrary amount of foreign workers to work there, bypassing the normal visa process. Moreover it's questionable whether that "installing..." excuse would even hold. The OP article mentioned that over 400 workers, mostly south korean nationals were arrested in the raids, but another source[2] suggests the factory's employment is around 400 people. If it was really installing equipment, I'd expect it to be 5-10% of the factory's workforce, not 50-100%.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyundai_Motor_Group_Metaplant_...

[2] https://georgia.org/press-release/hyundai-supplier-pha-creat...

	▲	throw0101c 2 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		> In any case according to wikipedia[1] it was constructed between 2022-2024, and "full production" (of cars, presumably) began in October 2024, almost a year ago. By all accounts it wasn't "under construction". As someone who has worked in IT for a few decades, I have had to go 'into production' with services while things still needed to be, and were still being, built out. Factories are large and complex: just because one part has been deployed doesn't mean another part has. One simple possibility: they went 'into production' being able to produce X units per week, but work was being done to be able to expand to X+30% units.
	▲	lokar 2 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		The car factory has been done for a while. What was being fitted out was a new LG battery factory next to it.