The Latest from Iran (29 March): Questionable Authority

1755 GMT: "Expert" Speculation of the Day. Meir Javedanfar gets himself into The Huffington Post with this assertion:

Until recently, both Tehran and Jerusalem saw the health care debate as an item that could significantly weaken Obama's standing at home, which in turn would reduce his leverage abroad. They were hoping that a defeat would force Obama to focus on his troubles at home.

I'll check with Ali Yenidunya on the Israeli angle, but I have seen nothing to indicate that the Iranian Government was counting on the health care issue to limit and even damage the US President.

1525 GMT: Jailing Persian Cats. On the same day that we noted the drama-posing-as-documentary No Time for Persian Cats, its storyline of Iranians trying to evade the authorities to play music comes true: underground rap artist Sasi Mankan has been arrested.

Just trying to learn more about Mankan, but here's a sample of his music:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=suqzMyBEZ8k[/youtube]

NEW Iran: A View from the Labour Front (Rahnema)
NEW Iran’s Nukes: False Alarm Journalism (Sick)
Iran’s Nukes: The Dangerous News of The New York Times
The Latest from Iran (28 March): Dealing with Exaggerations

1300 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. RAHANA claims that children's rights activist Maryam Zia Movahed, detained since 31 December, has been moved to a clinic in Evin Prison after starting a hunger strike on 17 March.


Peyke Iran writes that Azeri journalist and human rights activist Shahnaz Gholami has been given a prison sentence of eight years in absentia by a Tabriz court. Gholami is currently in Turkey and seeking asylum. The site also claims that Abdolreza Qanbari, a teacher from Pakdasht, has been sentenced to death for "mohareb" (war against God).

Rah-e-Sabz has published the names of 41 detained human rights activists.

1230 GMT: Parliament v. President. There's a sharp analysis by Hamid Takapu in Rah-e-Sabz of the debate over subsidy cuts since 2008. Takapu argues that the sword of a referendum, demanded by the President on his current proposals, could cut two ways: a successful challenge could reduce Parliament to a symbolic body (Takapu uses the analogy of the Russian Duma) but it could also strike Ahmadinejad if people ask for referendums on bigger issues.

0950 GMT: Labour Watch. We've posted a lengthy extract from an interview with Saeed Rahnema, a labour activist in the 1979 Islamic Revolution, analysing the state of the labour movement and, more broadly, of activism in the post-election conflict.

0655 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Professor Seyed Ahmad Miri of the Islamic Iran Participation Front has been arrested in Babol, while journalist Sasan Aghaei and women's rights activist Somaiyeh Farid have been released on bail.

0615 GMT: We begin this morning with a series of dubious attempts to claim authority in and about Iran. The New York Times' claimed reporting on the Iranian nuclear programme, which we criticised yesterday, is taken apart further by Gary Sick.

Inside Iran, President Ahmadinejad continued his campaign to overturn the Parliament's decision on his subsidy reforms and spending plan, using a marker and whiteboard to provide the truth to journalists. He thus proved beyond doubt that this will be another year of prosperity and "huge victories" for Iran.

The problem for the President is that not everyone believes him. While his supporter Mohammad Karim Shahrzad has challenged one of Ahmadinejad's leading Parliamentary critics, Ahmad Tavakoli, to a televised debate, legislator Seyed Reza Akrami says the President has taken an oath to implement the law and thus the decision of the Parliament.

Iran: A View from the Labour Front (Rahnema)

This is an extract from a Tehran Bureau interview with Saeed Rahnema, a labour activist in the 1979 Islamic Revolution who is now a Professor of Political Science at York University in Toronto, Canada. The full interview includes Rahnema's analysis of labour's role in 1979 and the aftermath of the Revolution:

TEHRAN BUREAU: When I read articles about Iran today, there is a great deal of social unrest around economic issues, particularly workers not getting paid. There are many labor actions but not a labor movement per se. I wonder what kind of possibilities there are for economic issues becoming more of a question for the Green Movement?

The Latest from Iran (29 March): Questionable Authority

RAHNEMA: There is now a major economic crisis in Iran. Massive unemployment, terrible inflation (close to 30%), and at the same time, as you rightly said, there are many factories that cannot pay their employees. In terms of leadership there is political anarchy.


You have got government-owned industries and then you have partially state-owned industries under the control of bonyads or Islamic foundations. The most significant bonyad is the Foundation of the Oppressed and Disabled (Bonyad-e Mostazafan va Janfazan). These are industries which had belonged to the Shahs' family and the pre-revolution bourgeoisie. After the time of the Shah they were all transferred to this particular foundation, which is now run by people close to the Bazaar of Iran and the clerical establishment. The bonyads are so large and so important that they are responsible for 20% of the Iranian GDP [Gross Domestic Product], which is only a bit lower than the Oil sector. Bonyads are not under the control of the state and pay no taxes.

It is an anarchic system with no serious protection for workers. Workers do not have a right to strike. They do not have unions and this is the main problem.

Many of these industries are heavily subsidized. But the government has decided to end some subsidies, along with the elimination of many gas, flour, and transportation subsides too. By ending subsidies, or having targeted subsidies, there will be more problems and more industrial actions. But these industrial actions --- and you rightly separate labor actions from a labor movement --- need labor unions. Labor unions are the most significant aspect of the rights of workers. Unions need democracy and political freedoms, a freedom of assembly and a free press. That is why the present movement within civil society is so significant for the labour movement.

This is something that tragically some so-called Leftists in the West do not understand. We read here and there, for example, James Petras among others, who support the brutal suppressive Islamic regime, and take a position against women, youth and the workers/employees of Iran who confront this regime. It is quite ironic that the formal site of the regime's news agency posted a translation of Petras' article accusing civil society activists of being agents of foreign imperialism.

What we need is continued weakening of the regime by street protests along with labor organizing. And, I think it is very important that we recognize that the Green Movement is part of a larger movement in Iranian civil society. The Green Movement is a very important part, but, it is not the whole picture. The Green Movement is now closely identified with Mr. Mousavi. So far he has been on the side of the people and civil society. Everyone supports him. But what will happen? Will he make major concessions? That remains to be seen.

TEHRAN BUREAU: There is a lot of confusion about the character of the regime because of its populist rhetoric. I am wondering what effect this confusion has on the possibility of organizing a trade union movement in Iran?

RAHNEMA: From the beginning, there were many illusions about the regime. One section of the Left, seeking immediate socialist revolution, immaturely confronted the regime and was brutally eliminated during the revolution. Another section of the Iranian left supported the regime, under the illusion of its anti-imperialism, and undermined democracy by supporting or even in some cases collaborating with the regime. This section paid a heavy price as well. Now, ironically, some leftist in the west are making the same mistakes under the same illusions.

There are four major illusions about Iran. The first is that the regime is democratic because it has elections. Leaving aside election fraud, in Iran not everyone can run for Parliament or the Presidency because an unelected twelve-member religious body, the Guardian Council, decides who can be nominated. Also, the Supreme Leader, who has absolute power, is not accountable to anybody.

The second illusion is the Regimes' anti-imperialism. Other than strong rhetoric against Israel and the U.S., the regime has done nothing that shows that they are anti-imperialist. Actually on several occasions they whole-heartedly supported the Americans in Afghanistan and at times in Iraq. Anti-imperialism has a much deeper meaning and does not apply to a reactionary force which dreams of expanding influence beyond its borders. If that is anti-imperialism, then the better example is Osama Bin Laden.

The third illusion is that this is a government of the dispossessed. A lot can be said about this, but I will limit myself to two income inequality measurements. Currently the Gini coefficient is around 44. (The range is from zero to a hundred, with zero as the most equal and one hundred as the most unequal.) This is worse than Egypt, Algeria, Jordan, and many other countries, despite the enormous riches of Iran. Interestingly, this figure is not so different from the time of the Shah. The other measurement, the deciles distribution of the top 10% and lowest 10 % income groups, shows that the top deciles' per capita per day expenditure is about 17 times that of the lowest deciles. This figure is also quite similar to the pre-revolutionary period.

The fourth illusion is that the regime is based on a 'moral' Islamic economy and not a capitalist economy. This moral economy, as Petras calls it, is nothing but the most corrupt capitalist system that we could possibly imagine.

TEHRAN BUREAU: There are some nascent unions, such as the bus drivers, sugar cane workers at Haft Tapeh, as well as teachers. These groups have been asking for international solidarity for a long time now. I wonder why those groups have had such a difficult time developing support. Have the conversations among "left" groups about anti-Imperialism blinded them to these small but very real organizing efforts?

RAHNEMA: No doubt. Some among the left in the West make the same mistakes that the Iranian left made during the revolution -- focusing on anti-imperialism and undermining and minimizing democracy and political freedoms. If the left really cares about the working class, how can this class improve its status without trade unions? How can trade unions exist and function without democracy and social and political freedoms?

Another aspect that some leftists don't take into consideration is the significance of secularism and the dangers of a religious state, particularly, the manner in which such regimes impinge on the most basic private rights of the individual, particularly women. Even if the Islamic regime were anti-imperialist, no progressive individual could possibly condone the brutal suppression of workers, women, and youth, who want to get rid of an obscurantist authoritarian and corrupt regime. The underground workers groups and other activists within civil society need all the support they can get from progressive people outside Iran, and they despise those so-called leftists in the West who support Ahmadinejad and the Islamic regime.