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PROTEST: Iranian government out,of the International Labour Organisation (ILO)

Worker-communist Party of Iran-UK | 08.02.2006 11:39 | Anti-racism | Social Struggles | Workers' Movements


Join the Protest;To support workers of BusCompany in Tehran
When: Friday 10 February, 12:00-2:00
Where: ILO, 21-24 Millbank Tower, London, SWP
Nearest tube station:
Westminster (bus 77A, 88) & Pimlico, Victoria ( bus 507)

Join the Protest;
Workers of Iran need your support!
Iranian government out
of the International Labour Organisation (ILO)

To support workers of Bus Company in Tehran
To condemn the Islamic regime of Iran for attacking workers
To demand the immediate release of arrested workers
To demand the exclusion of the Islamic Republic and its Islamic councils from the ILO
JOIN US
When: Friday 10 February, 12:00-2:00

Where: ILO, 21-24 Millbank Tower, London, SWP
Nearest tube station:
Westminster (bus 77A, 88) & Pimlico, Victoria ( bus 507)

Tel: 07950924434

Worker-communist Party of Iran - UK Organisation
February 1, 2006

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Tehran Bus Workers' Protest - Update 14, Friday 3 February 2006

The following is the letter (translated) from the families of the arrested bus workers, who held a protest rally on Wednesday, 1st February, outside the National Assembly (Majles). A second rally has been called for 10am this Saturday, when the families will be joined by bus workers at the end of their night shift. Also as previously announced, the workers are due to take part in an all-out stoppage today, Friday.

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To: Mr Juan Somavia, Director-General of the International Labour Organisation (ILO)

Copy to: International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) and all the world’s labour organisations


Protest at the membership of the Islamic Republic of Iran
and Islamic Councils of Labour in the ILO


3 February 2006

Dear Mr Juan Somavia,

I am writing to highlight once again the demand of Iranian workers for the expulsion of the Islamic Republic of Iran and Islamic Councils of Labour from the ILO. Islamic Councils and their national co-ordinating centre “Workers’ House” are state-made bodies which for over two decades have been actively taking part in the surveillance of labour activists and crushing of labour protests in Iran’s industrial workplaces. By admitting these organisations into the ILO as “workers’ representatives”, the ILO is setting itself against the workers in Iran and their rightful demand for the dissolution of these bodies and for the formation of genuine workers’ organisations.

I am sure you are well aware of the history of Islamic Councils. Nevertheless, here I would like to put before you once again the background to the formation of these organisations and their record over these years; I would like to re-state my and Iranian workers’ protest to their continued membership in the ILO.

These councils were set up following the violent suppression of workers’ protests and workers’ organisations by the Islamic Republic regime in 1984. They are led by a national co-ordinating centre called “Workers’ House”. As their name suggests, these are ideological Islamic bodies, in which, by law, only persons who are faithful to the Islamic Republic and the government of the Islamic clergy, who do not have a record of opposition to the government and whose suitability has been approved by a vetting body - appointed by the Labour Ministry and police authorities - have the right to stand to Islamic Council positions.

The Iranian Constitution explicitly instructs Islamic councils to report any ‘disturbance and unpleasant incidents’ at the workplace to the authorities concerned. Their duties have been defined as co-operating with management, raising productivity and maintaining order and discipline and Islamic morals in the workplace. Their job, in other words, is to identify and report labour activists for persecution, to harass female workers on observance of the Islamic dress code (Hejab), to sow seeds of dissension among workers on the basis of religion and gender, to control labour protests in the interest of employers and the state and to serve as the state’s organisational alternative to workers’ attempts to organise freely.
As an example, you must be aware that on 9 May 2005 high-ranking officials of Islamic Councils and Workers’ House brutally attacked a meeting of Tehran’s bus workers’ union (Vahed), using knives and carpet cutters, wounding Mansoor Ossanlou’s tongue. Mr Ossanlou, as you will know, is the head of the Syndicate of Workers of Tehran and Suburbs Vahed Bus Company, who has been imprisoned since 22 December 2005 without access to lawyers or family on account of his labour activities. Mr Ossanlou’s eye was also injured in this attack. In an interview with Towlid Monthly last month, Alireza Mahjoob, the head of the Workers’ House and himself a high ranking official of the regime, defended the attack by saying that security exists only for those who work within the law, and that if somebody whose activity is outside the law is killed that is not murder. He labels union activists as criminals and even regards using the word ‘union’ and wearing a tie as a crime.

An even clearer instance was the role of the Islamic Council of Tehran Bus Company in the recent strike by Tehran’s bus workers. According to the executive of the bus workers’ union, officials of the Islamic Council worked with the security forces by identifying the union members and activists. In this strike more than 1,000 workers were arrested; even the wives and children of the union executive were arrested and beaten. The company’s Islamic council co-operated with the regime in even denying that there was a strike.

My question is, is it not shameful that such people are recognised as representatives of Iranian workers by the ILO, while, for example, the bus workers’ union is not? Is not just this attack on the bus workers enough to show that Islamic councils are the government’s gangs in the workplace for repressing Iranian workers? Is it not shameful that a mob with such a bloody record of attacks on workers has been recognised by the ILO as representatives of Iranian workers? Are these facts not enough to expel the Islamic Republic and its Islamic Councils from the ILO?


Dear Mr Somavia,

I call on you to expel the Islamic councils and Workers’ House from the ILO and not continue to set yourself against Iranian workers. This policy of the ILO has already brought much disrepute for your organisation.

I request the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) and all the world’s labour organisations to join the bus workers in Tehran, the 2,400 labour activists in Iran who last year sent a petition to the ILO in protest at its policy and all Iranian workers to exert pressure on the ILO for the expulsion of the Islamic Republic of Iran and its Islamic councils from the ILO.


Regards,

Shahla Daneshfar
Co-ordinator of the International Labour Solidarity Committee of the
Worker-communist Party of Iran

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The following is the transcript of a radio interview with 12-year-old Mahdiye Salimi, daughter of arrested union activist Yaghoub Salimi. It first appeared in WPI Briefing 188-9, 30 January 2006, which we are reproducing here. Translation by Arash Sorx.

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Even children are not spared!

Interview with Mahdiye Salimi, the 12 year old daughter of union member who was beaten and arrested


As reported in WPI Briefing, up to 700 workers of the Syndicate of Workers and Employees of Tehran and Suburbs Vahed Bus Company have been arrested. Moreover, the wives and children of some executive members have also been arrested. They were taken out of bed and beaten up during raids on Friday 27 January night. The beatings continued in detention. Substitute member of the union’s executive board, Yaghoub Salimi's 2-year-old daughter was injured on her face in the attack, when she was thrown into a waiting patrol van. Her 12-year-old elder sister, Mahdiye, described the ordeal in detail in an interview with a radio station abroad. Below you will find a translation of the full transcript of radio “Avaye Ashena” (familiar voice) interview with 12 year old Mahdiye Salimi:


Reporter: Hello.

Mahdiye: Hello. How are you?

Reporter: Thank you. I hope you are alright. Please tell us what happened.

Mahdiye: We were asleep. They rang the doorbell of our home. They called out: Mrs. Salami, come to door for one moment” They were in such a hurry that they didn’t even allow my mom to dress properly. As soon as my mom opened the door, they poured into our home. I was asleep along with Mrs. Zia’s daughter. They pulled the blankets from our bodies and started to hit us with their “feet and hands” and told us to get into the van. Mrs. Razavi wanted to get some clothes for her daughter and they started to hit her badly. They even kicked my mom’s heart with their boots and my mom had an enormous ache in her heart. She still has some wounds on her body. They hit her with a baton and didn’t listen to my mother's appeals. They even wanted to spray something in my [2 year old] sister’s mouth.

Then they took us to detention. Where we went was not hygienic at all and it was so cold. We asked for blankets. They said “we don’t have any”. “We are just doing our duty”. They hit us so much. We asked for lunch. They brought us the leftovers of their own lunch which was nasty chicken skin mixed with some kind of sauce.

Reporter: Why did they keep hitting you and your mom?

Mahdiye: She wanted to get on the van but first wanted to take my sister to the bathroom. As soon as she started to go, they grabbed my sister from behind and pushed her into the van. My sister hit her head when she was thrown into the van and they also kept hitting my mom.

Reporter: Did they do all of this in the street? Did your neighbours see all this?

Mahdiye: Yes they did. All the neighbours came out and were watching what was going on. When they raided our home, there was at least 70-80 of them while we were only 3 women and 5 children. They rushed to the roof so no one could escape. They even went to our neighbours' homes and even arrested our neighbours' guests.

Reporter: What did they want?

Mahdiye: They wanted to know where my dad is. We didn’t know that. We didn’t have any news of my dad's whereabouts.

Reporter: Where is your mom right now?

Mahdiye: Yesterday they told us that she will be released soon. They wanted to bring her to the Ministry of Intelligence. Somebody said they might take her to Evin Prison but then they said she would be taken to the fourth base of the Ministry of Intelligence.

Reporter: how old are you?

Mahdiye: I am 12.

Reporter: Did they hit you?

Mahdiye: Yes they did. They hit all of us. Even a child from year 1. They made all the children cry.

Reporter: can I ask your name?

Mahdiye: I am Mahdiye Salimi.

Reporter: Why do you think they are doing this? Has your father done something wrong?

Mahdiye: Nothing. My father has done nothing wrong. He just has asked for his rights. The rights that they didn’t give him. For example for every 200 tomans of his wage, they have taken 100 for themselves.

Reporter: Are you going to the prison with your father again?

Mahdiye: Yes.

Reporter: Are you anxious?

Mahdiye: Of course I am. How can I not be? When they took my mother they didn’t even let us to be with her for a moment. They even didn’t let us hug her.

Reporter: I heard that your [two year old] sister was also wounded. Is that true?

Mahdiye: Yes. When they pushed her into the van, her lips hit metal and was badly hurt.

Reporter: Did they continue hitting your mom there?

Mahdiye: Yes they did. They hit her even there.

Reporter: Is your school closed?

Mahdiye: No it is not. It was supposed to be closed because of heavy snowfall but they announced that it was open.

Reporter: So you missed school too?

Mahdiye: Yes. I missed my classes.

Reporter: How many children were there?

Mahdiye: There were 5. Mrs, Zia's daughter from year 3 (10 years old). Mrs. Razavi's daughter from year 1(7 years old). And one from year 9 (15 years) and myself (I am 12 year old and from year 6) and my own sister who is 2 and a half.

Reporter: And how many women? Do you remember how many you were in total?

Mahdiye: There were 3 women.

Reporter: Are you the only children who were released?

Mahdiye: No all the children were released but our mothers (my mother and Mrs. Zia) have not been released yet.

Reporter: What do you want from people who are listening to you? What is your wish?

Mahdiye: I want them to defend us. Do something so my mother will be released soon. Now our mother is in detention and there is nobody to take care of us.

Worker-communist Party of Iran-UK
- e-mail: wpiengland@yahoo.co.uk
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