US slams Islamic regime for repression of Bus drivers

SMCCDI:

The United States Government slammed, today, the Islamic republic regime for its dark human rights records and for the repression of "Tehran's Collective Bus Company" (TCBC) employees.

In response to a question taken, at its January 30 regular briefing, the U.S. State Department expressed support for Iranian workers and their right to protest for better working conditions. The today's statement specifically mentioned bus drivers in Iran, who in recent weeks have been demonstrating peacefully for the right to bargain collectively. "These workers have faced arrests, threats and intimidation from the Iranian government" the State Department said.

To the question "What is the U.S. reaction to reports of violence and the arrest of bus drivers in Iran?", the US State Department posted in its official website, its spokesman's answer stating: "We condemn the Iranian Government's forcible suppression of peaceful demonstrations by bus drivers in Tehran over the past few weeks. The attempts of these Iranian workers to seek the redress of legitimate grievances and the right to collectively bargain have been met by the Iranian Government with arrests, threats, and intimidation. ...As we have noted in our Country Report on Human Rights Practices in Iran, the Iranian Government's poor record on freedom of speech and the freedom to peacefully assemble continues to deteriorate. Incidents such as these clearly illustrate that the Government of Iran is engaged in the systematic oppression of its citizens, including the persecution of individuals for religious, political and other reasons. We support the Iranian people's right to a free and open society, and urge the Government of Iran to respect the rights of its citizens to express themselves freely without fear of intimidation or imprisonment."

Hundreds of TCBC employees were arrested and tens, including wives and children, were wounded following last Saturday's strike, by brutal Islamist militiamen and Islamic regime's plain clothes' agents. Most of the arrested are kept in section 240 of the infamous Evin political jail and several of them have been put in solitary confinement in order to make false confessions on links with foreign intelligence.

Many of TCBC employees are going to stay home, this upcoming Friday, by refusing to show up at their shifts in sign of solidarity with those imprisoned or injured. The movement of the Tehran's Collective Bus Company's drivers, if extended due to a free world's support, might lead to the apparition of a worker movement, such as, the 1980's Solidarnosc (Solidarity) which was able to rally various economic sectors behind it and to create the possibility of radical political changes in Poland. Solidarnosc was the independent Polish Shipyards' Workers' Union formed in Gdansk, lead by Lech Walesa, and which was in opposition to the Militaro-Communist rule of General Jaruzelski backed by the defunct USSR.

Without doubt, the continuation of public supports, such as those made by US officials and Government, and a real financial support for the TCBC strikers can plunge the Islamic regime into an abyss from which it can not escape. The result would no more lead to just obtaining some controlled 'greater freedoms or liberties' in the frame of the current theocratic regime, but to a total liberation of Iran due to a secular and democratic revolution without any need to any kind of military intervention. The trend has become more noticeable, as especially the absolute majority of Iranians have well taken their distances from the regime's "reformists from within" and some of their docile so-called student associations, such as, the "Office of Consolidation Unity" (OCU).