SEOUL -- Samsung Electronics has stopped orders from China-based Dongguan Shinyang Electronics after a workers rights group

found evidence the factory employed underage workers. The decision by the world's largest electronics company to suspend its relationship with the vendor is significant because heretofore calls to cut off law-breaking vendors have previously been ignored.

The findings of worker abuse were first alleged by China Labor Watch last week. The labor rights group said it located "several children employed without labor contracts, working 11 hours per day and only being paid for 10 of those hours" at a Dongguan Shinyang Electronics plant. Some of the workers were as young as 14 and were assigned to night shifts that ended at  8 am, CLW said.

Two weeks ago, Samsung published its 2014 sustainability report, in which it said inspections of working conditions at 200 suppliers found “no instances" of child labor. 

CLW, which has dogged Samsung for two years for violating laws protecting workers, numerated a total of 15 sets of labor violations, including "a lack of pre-job safety training and protective equipment despite the use of harmful chemicals; discriminatory hiring; overuse of temp workers; workers made to sign blank labor contracts; illegal resignation requirements; potential audit fraud; broad company regulations that establishes the pretext to punish workers for almost any behavior; a lack of any union; and poor living conditions." Many of the allegations involve the breaking of China labor law.

Samsung, which like some other major electronics companies has a zero-tolerance policy on use of child workers, said it would permanently sever its supply relationship with Dongguan Shinyang Electronics if the allegations were found to be true.

The Shinyang Electronics factory in Dongguan employs about 1,200 workers, where they make plastic moldings and assemblys for Samsung phones.

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