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April 2001
Protests in Iran
In Tehran during the festival of fire (Chahar-Shanbeh Souri) in March there
were several explosions. Many observers said that some of the explosions
were directed at security forces and against the Islamic regime. Most of
the women wore heavy makeup to show their rejection of anti-women Islamic
roles. Thousands of people came out to the streets and showed their
rejection of Islamic theocracy.
These days there are raging debates both inside and outside Iran over how
the Islamic regime is trying to stop any movement for freedom and how it is
attacking any basic demand for political freedoms such as freedom of
speech, press, and public assembly. Over the last few years Iranians have
been demanding more political and economic freedoms from this regime. But
now they have seen that this regime is not only rejecting these demands but
also attacking what gains have been achieved with their struggles. There
have been large numbers of demonstrations, strikes and different forms of
struggles happening this year.
During the last few months we saw uprisings in several cities-Abadan in the
south of Iran, Sanndaj in Kurdistan, Ajabshir in Azerbaijan, Kashmar and
Esfehan central cities, Khoramabad in Lorestan, Tehran, and some other
cities in central and southern Iran. In some of them, like Sanndaj, the
city was under the control of the people for several hours.
We also had workers strikes, demonstrations and protests including:
Autobus Rani workers (the transit company); workers in Sherkat Ghataat
Fouladi Iran (Ghataat Steel Company of Iran)-Karaj (near Tehran); workers
from Nassaj Poush textile factory situated in Sari (northern Iran); Chit
Rey (textile and knitting factory) workers in southern Tehran (this was
their second protest), and workers in Tehran protesting for the minimum
wage to be in line with the rate of inflation.
More than 500 workers in the Simin weaving factories in Isfahan (south of
Tehran) were demonstrating in the city center and Isfahan security forces
attacked these demonstrators. Most of these protests are for non-payment of
wages and benefits for several months, unemployment, and difficult and
health-damaging conditions of work.
I believe that Ayatollah Khamenei's order last year to the parliament to
stop any discussion of freedom of the press put an end to the reformers'
illusions, but did not stop people's struggles for freedom. Events in Iran
during the last several months are an indication that people want the
Islamic regime to go, but at the same time are looking for a lasting
alternative. They learned from past experience that it is an illusion that
the political overthrow is automatically going to bring them freedom. We
never should forget how in the 1979 Iranian revolution counter-revolution
arose within the revolution. What people are searching for this time is not
only what we are against, which I believe they know, but what we are for--or
what Marx called revolution in permanence.
--Alireza Ardebili
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