Hon Hai in damage control blitz after worker suicides

LONGHUA, China (Reuters) - Dressed in white, the traditional colour of mourning in China, the father of 19-year-old Ma Xiangqian weeps outside the gates of a sprawling electronics complex. His wife and daughter kneel alongside.

Ma is one of nine workers who have died in apparent suicides at tightly guarded factory complexes this year, raising questions about the harsher aspects of blue-collar life around southern China's Pearl River Delta -- dubbed the workshop to the world.

The parents say Ma, who was found dead at the bottom of a stairway at the campus in January, died under mysterious circumstances. They want to know why.

"All we want to know is the truth. We don't even want compensation," said the father.

The Longhua factory belongs to Hon Hai Precision Industry Co, the Taiwan giant that is contracted to make electronics for Apple Inc and most major PC brands.

Hon Hai Chairman Terry Gou, one of Taiwan's best known businessmen, on Wednesday led reporters on a rare media tour of the Chinese plant, part of an unprecedented publicity blitz to counter a growing backlash over the suicides.

"You can see we've got these facilities for workers who want to relax," Gou said, standing by an Olympic-size swimming pool in the vast Longhua complex, which has tree-lined avenues, post offices, banks and bakeries catering to many of around 400,000 workers it employs in southern China.

"This is not a place that treats its workers badly," added Gou, who is known for guarding his privacy jealously.

HIGH STAKES

The stakes are high for Hon Hai and its Foxconn unit that makes mobile phones for the world's top brands, amid growing calls from activists for a global boycott of products like Apple's latest generation iPhone.

Hon Hai's client list reads like a Who's Who of electronics makers -- from Apple and PC giants Hewlett-Packard Co and Dell, to the world's top mobile maker Nokia.

"It's a crucial issue that Hon Hai has to deal with right away. If not, Nokia, HP and Apple might cut their orders as pressure against buying their products could be mounting," said Andrew Deng, an analyst with Taiwan International Securities.

Hon Hai and Foxconn have come under fire for their harsh and secretive corporate culture.

Apple said on Wednesday it was saddened by the apparent suicides, and would continue to inspect all facilities where its products are made.

"We are saddened and upset by the recent suicides at Foxconn," the maker of iPhones and iPads said in its first public comment on the deaths at Foxconn's production complex.

"We are in direct contact with Foxconn senior management and we believe they are taking this matter very seriously," Apple said in a statement, adding its own investigating team were carrying out independent evaluations of what Foxconn was doing to "address these tragic events."

In a separate statement, Dell said: "Foxconn is contract manufacturer for Dell. Any reports of poor working conditions in Dell's supply chain are investigated and, if warranted, appropriate action is taken.

"We expect our suppliers to employ the same high standards we do in our own facilities. We enforce these standards through a variety of tools, including the Electronics Industry code of conduct, business reviews with suppliers, self-assessments and audits."

(Additional reporting by James Pomfret in HONG KONG and Faith Hung and Jonathan Standing in TAIPEI)

(Editing by Doug Young, Chris Lewis and Ian Geoghegan)