BY THE INTERNATIONAL LEAGUE OF PEOPLES’ STRUGGLES
London, England
DEMOCRATIC SPACE
Posted by Bulatlat.com
Vol. VIII, No. 28, August 17-23, 2008
News coming from Iran indicates an alarming rise in the number of executions and an intensification of the suppression of the progressive popular movements of workers, students and youth, women, national minorities, journalists, intellectuals and other sections of society.
Coinciding with the 20th anniversary of the massacre of over 18,000 political prisoners in Iran in 1988, on Sunday July 27, 2008 the regime of Islamic republic executed 29 people in the notorious Evin Prison. This is the prison that was built by the Shah and has been the scene of untold crimes and barbarities against the people of Iran that includes systematic torture and execution of thousands of communists, democratic and anti-imperialist militants and progressive elements during the regime of the shah and throughout the 30 years rule of the Islamic republic. Evin prison was a major site for the execution of political prisoners by the reactionary regime of Islamic Republic in 1988.
The regime of Islamic republic throughout its bloody rule has systematically executed revolutionary and progressive political prisoners labeling them as criminals and drug traffickers. Many of those executed on Sunday may have been progressive prisoners detained during protest actions such as the spontaneous fuel uprisings of last year, Mayday protests, students’ actions and others captured during sweeping arrests by the authorities.
The alarming scale of the repression became apparent when the regime announced the transfer of tens of political prisoners including known activists to the section 209 of Evin Prison. There is an imminent danger to the lives of political prisoners including known activists such as journalists, Adnan Hassanpour and Abdolvahed “Hiwa” Bootimar WHO have been condemned to death! Farzad Kamangar, a teacher, journalist and human rights activist from Kamyaran in Kurdistan, accused of membership in PKK has also been sentenced to death by the authorities. There is no doubt that the lives of all political prisoners are in extreme danger. Further, news from Iran indicates that eight women and one man are awaiting death by stoning.
This is not the first time that the reactionary regime of Islamic republic in order to stem the rise of the people’s struggle has resorted to brute force and suppression to overcome its crisis and at the same time has engaged in adventurist policies to divert public attention from its internal crisis.
During the past 30 years of its reactionary existence, the regime of Islamic republic has imposed fascist suppression of the revolutionary movement, systematically attacking people’s just struggles. It has violently attacked workers, students, women and oppressed national and religious minorities.
During the past 30 years the regime of Islamic republic has imposed a reign of terror and intimidation against the people of Iran, assassinating intellectuals, writers and opposition figures at home and abroad. It has filled its prisons and torture chambers several times over and has eliminated tens of thousands of political prisoners.
In the context of the general crisis of capitalism and the current instabilities and crisis of the imperialist system on a world scale, the crisis of the dependent regime of Islamic republic in Iran, has worsened. The current spate of terror and suppression comes under conditions of worsening economic, social and political crisis engulfing the regime and is by far more severe than at any time in the past. The burgeoning crisis in Iran is foremost due to the reactionary and dependent nature of Islamic republic and its policies that has devastated the agricultural economy, increased dependency on oil exports as the source of state revenue, pilfering and open theft by the regime’s cronies, the heavy burden of military spending and its adventures in neighbouring countries including collaboration with Anglo-US imperialist occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan. The inflationary effects of the rise in oil prices on the dependent economy, added to the consequences of large scale privatisation of industries, the existence of large numbers of unemployed particularly amongst the youth and the pauperisation of large sections of the population have dramatically increased the depths of the crisis in Iran fuelling the peoples’ militant, democratic and just struggles against the regime.
During the past three years the numbers of workers strikes across the country have increased three fold, students’ protests are on the rise in all major universities of the country, women’s struggle for their rights has intensified and all national minorities including Azeri, Kurdish, Arab, Balooch and Turkeman have intensified their struggles for their just rights. In suppressing the national minorities, the chauvinist regime of Islamic republic uses it paramilitary forces to brutally terrorise the inhabitants of these regions. It collaborates with the neighbouring reactionary and fascist regimes such as the regime in Turkey, to bomb Kurdish villages and townships.
We call on all democratic, anti-imperialist and progressive forces around the world to join us in condemning the latest rise in executions in Iran by the reactionary regime of Islamic republic!
We demand the release of all political prisoners and the immediate secession of all executions in Iran!
We condemn the collaboration of the Iranian and Turkish regimes against the people of the two countries and in particular their genocidal policies towards the Kurdish people!
FED-BIR, DEVRIMCI HAREKAT (REVOLUTIONARY MOVEMENT), GIKDER, TOHUM CULTURAL CENTRE, KURDISH CULTURAL CENTRE , HUNDRED FLOWERS CULTURAL CENTRE, YASANACAK DUNYA( A WORLD FOR LIVING) MAGAZINE, ATIK COMMITTEE – LONDON, ACTIVISTS OF PEOPLE’S FADAII GUERRILLAS IN LONDON, DEMOCRATIC-ANTI IMPERIALIST ORGANISATION OF IRANIANS IN BRITAIN. (Posted by Bulatlat.com)
