Apple called on its suppliers to treat workers with "dignity and respect" Wednesday after the reported suicide of a factory employee in China who had been accused of stealing a new iPhone model.
Sun Danyong, 25, leaped to his death from a 12th floor apartment in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen on July 16 after his employer, Taiwan's Foxconn group, said he had stolen the sample iPhone, the China Daily said.
The missing phone was one of a batch of 16 samples produced by Foxconn, which is under license to produce iPhones, at its Shenzhen plant, it said.
Sun graduated from a top-level Chinese technical institute last year and had been tasked with the final packing of the shipment of the phones, it said.
After the phone went missing, Foxconn launched an investigation.
The China Daily report did not say whether the company probe concluded that Sun had in fact stolen the missing iPhone.
"We are saddened by the tragic loss of this young employee, and we are awaiting results of the investigations into his death," Jill Tan, a Hong Kong-based spokeswoman for Apple, told AFP.
"We require our suppliers to treat all workers with dignity and respect."
Tan refused further comment on the incident, including details about the circumstances of Sun's death, saying Apple did not divulge information about its suppliers.
The China Daily said Foxconn spokesman James Lee had confirmed the suicide and apologised to Sun's family.
"His suicide, for whatever reason, in a way reflects a management defect on the part of Foxconn… especially over the troubles faced by our young employees," it quoted Lee as saying.
Lee said that a company official who reportedly struck Sun during the investigation had been suspended from his post pending a police probe, the paper said.
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