Around 30 people gathered on Grand Rue to highlight concerns over Amazon’s tax contributions, as well as the lack of transparency over its water consumption or CO2 emissions.
Among the posters visible in the crowds were slogans such as “Make Amazon pay”, “Amazon supports Trump’s racist, sexist and LGBTA+phobic politics” or “Amazon messes with its customers’ private data”.
The protest was organised by the CELL platform, the ASTM, the OGJ, Greenpeace and the Left, among others, and forms part of a global protest action held in over 30 countries.
The protesters’ criticism is that Amazon is repeatedly given special treatment on various points. From an environmental perspective, the company is not transparent. “Amazon is choosing different numbers to say: Look, that tree is great. But we are talking about the whole forest. About the entire impact through Amazon,” says Léonard Andersen from CELL.
Like many other tech giants, Amazon specialises in avoiding tax, says Jean-Sébastien Zippert from Collectif Tax Justice Lëtzebuerg. The business does not pay tax in relation to its profits, he said. “Luxembourg should put a ‘country by country reporting system in place,” he explains. This means every company has to report its profits per country where it operates, and explain their profits in relation to staff wages.
The Left’s André Marques says Amazon supports an authoritarian regime in the US where human rights are being abused. Therefore one must ask if the tax deal the government has with Amazon is still justified. Another question revolves around data protection, as Amazon can do what it wants with customer data. Marques asks what does great investment into the company bring to Luxembourg, when it plans to scrap jobs in this country? If people are being replaced with AI then they will purchase even less in Luxembourg and contribute less to the economy.
Collectif Palestine Lëtzebuerg also joined the protest as Amazon participated in Project Nimbus. This saw Amazon and Google providing data, AI and cloud services which were used by Israel in Gaza. Representative Marc Burgraff says these were used for bombardments and for verifying military targets. “They had to terminate the contact as it resulted in clear violations of human rights.”
The protesters say Amazon needs to take action. Léonard Andersen from CELL said the company had to engage with criticism, improve transparency and stop misleading people with their excuses. The government and other authorities must demand more efforts in terms of environment and taxation. “And consumers, people who buy from them. It’s for our health and for future generations.”
Read also: Black Friday most important day for retail, says employers’ association
