Protesters in Iran welcome this major development!

Reports received today (Monday 10 October) from Iran indicate that workers in the country’s oil industry, a powerful sphere of influence, have joined the nationwide protest movement calling for an end to the 40-year-old ruling theocratic dictatorship.  This development will be a major boost to the organisers of the protest movement that has engulfed Iran for three weeks now, rocking the despotic Islamic Republic regime.  More than 100 cities and towns across Iran have been the scenes of unprecedented angry protest demonstrations since erupting on 16 September, the day that 22-year-old Mahsa Amini was announced to have died, three days after reportedly having been beaten while in the detention of the so-called “morality police” in Tehran.

The Council of Oil Contract Workers announced that 4,000 workers were striking, effectively shutting down several sites in the country’s key oil refinery sector; including Bushehr, Borzovieh, Hemgan, and Asaluyeh.  Project workers on the second phase of the Abadan refinery had also joined the action.  Workers gathered to block all roads leading to these complexes, essentially paralysing the sector and suspending the regime’s main income stream.  The Council of Oil Contract Workers had warned the government a week ago that they would take this action if regime forces continued to violently suppress the people’s protests.  In Bushehr, workers were filmed chanting “This year is the year of blood, Seyed Ali Khamenei [the country’s Supreme Leader] is done!”

The announcement of a strike by the oil contract workers working is a massive development in the escalating protests by Iran’s youth and women and will most certainly boost their morale in the times to come.

Last week, the influential Coordinating Council of Iranian Teachers’ Trade Associations (CCITTA) called a nationwide strike in support of the protesters calling for immediate change in the country. 

The oil contract workers, by pursuing their rightful and long-standing demands and emphasizing their class interests, are also defending the interests of all movements – including the demands of the brave women, students, and heroic youth, who resist the brutal repressive machine of the dictatorship in university campuses and on the streets in neighbourhoods across Iran.

Thus, the start of the oil contract workers’ strike and their shutting down of this key sector is extremely important against the backdrop of continuing regime repression and violence against the people on the streets of Iran and amidst a massive wave of arrests and disappearances.

CODIR has approached a number of national and international trade union bodies in an effort to explore ways of supporting their counterparts and protesters in Iran.

CODIR calls upon all trade union bodies across Europe to stand with the protesters and striking oil workers.

Please ensure your protests are directed at the President and Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and addressed to their embassies and missions across Europe.