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WASHINGTON — A Nicaraguan garment factory that supplies discounted clothing to American soldiers imposes sweatshop conditions and starvation wages on its workers, a lawsuit filed Tuesday contends. 

The lawsuit, filed by labor-rights attorneys in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, seeks punitive damages against the Chentex factory and its Taiwan-based parent, Nien Hsing. 

It contends Nien Hsing pays workers at the plant less than 20 cents for each pair of blue jeans sewn. The jeans retail for between $25 and $30, but workers receive what amounts to less than 30 cents an hour. 

At a Tuesday news conference, a sweatshop watchdog group said the jeans are sold to American military personnel through the Army and Air Force Exchange Service, which supplies servicemen and women. 

According to the National Labor Committee for Human Rights, the service imported 64 tons of blue jeans made at the Nicaraguan plant last July, August and September alone. 

“This factory in Nicaragua actually presents the true face of the global economy,” said Charles Kernaghan, executive director of the watchdog. “It’s one of oppression, starvation wages, mass firings, blacklisting, union busting and enormous corporate greed.” 

Pentagon officials admit to doing business with the company, but they say they found no evidence of poor working conditions when a delegation visited the Chentex plant several weeks ago. 

“We do business with them,” said Capt Eric Hilliard, public affairs officer for the Army and Air Force Exchange Service. “We went down there, checked it out, and we saw that things were up to par.” 

The Army and Air Force Exchange Service is one of the world’s largest retailers, operating 1,423 stores on U.S. military bases nationwide. It had $7.3 billion in sales last year. 

Kernaghan said he uncovered the link to the Pentagon while reviewing the company’s sales documents. Several American department stores – including Kohl’s, Kmart, Wal-Mart, Target and J.C. Penney – also had garment contracts with the company. 

Since last spring, the National Labor Committee has staged numerous demonstrations outside various Kohl’s stores, demanding that the company cut its ties with the Nicaraguan plant. More protests are planned elsewhere, Kernaghan said. 

Two congressional Democrats, Georgia Rep. Cynthia McKinney and Ohio Rep. Sherrod Brown, also attended the news conference. Brown traveled to Nicaragua in July and vouched for the deplorable treatment of the garment workers. 

McKinney, who in October introduced legislation that would require U.S. corporations to disclose information about their overseas operations, asked the General Accounting Office to conduct a study. 

“We have to understand these goods come to us at a tremendous human cost, and it’s not necessary,” said McKinney, who sits on the Armed Services and International Relations committees. 

Kernaghan said the Nicaraguan workers are asking for just eight cents more per garment – a raise he says would raise them from “misery to poverty.” 

“How in the world can we spent $60 billion on Star Wars and not be able to pay eight cents more for a pair of jeans?” McKinney said.