Iran: Eight Workers Set Themselves on Fire to Protest Brutal Exploitation by the Mullahs’ Regime

 

Written by
Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)

NCRI logoCall To Condemn Regime’s Anti-labor Policies and Serious Violations of International Laws and Standards
The state-run Etemad newspaper wrote on August 2: “From May 22 to July 31, eight workers set themselves on fire because they could not make ends meet. Reports show dismissal, layoffs, unresolved employment contracts, unanswered demands and inability to provide livelihood were the causes for the workers’ self-immolation.”

The exploitation and looting of toilers and workers increase every hour under the mullahs’ rule. Two years ago, the state-run daily Resalat reported on April 14, 2020, “By examining 20 companies, we found that these companies had a net profit of one quadrillion in one year.” One could imagine how the lives of hundreds of workers have been destroyed by the owners of these companies, who are none other than the regime’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and other ruling mullahs.

In addition to direct and cruel exploitation of workers, the regime increasingly exploits them by continuously printing fiat money and thus reducing their purchasing power. According to a report by Khabar Online website on July 31, 2022, “the Central Bank prints 3,810 billion rials a day.” The price of basic goods increases daily. On July 27, Mardom-Salari daily wrote, “According to the recent report by the Iran Statistics Center, the point-to-point inflation rate of the major group of food, beverages, and tobacco has reached 86%” while the actual inflation of livelihood basket of working families is more than 100%.” Also, on July 26, Hamdeli newspaper quoted the same center and wrote: “The group of oils and fats was at the top of July inflation with 293.1 percent, and the price of each kilogram of eggs reached 1000,000 rials.”

In a situation where the regime’s revenue from the sale of oil and petroleum products has increased significantly compared to last year, corruption worth hundreds of thousands of billion rials the cost of suppression, the staggering costs of nuclear and missile projects, and the export of terrorism are a black hole which swallows all the national wealth and resources of the laborers and workers.

As long as the mullahs’ dictatorship is in power, the workers and laborers will become more impoverished every day. This calamity can only be resolved by overthrowing this regime and establishing democracy and people’s sovereignty. Every factory, workshop, neighborhood, and the city should be turned into a center of rebellion so that the stolen rights of the people are taken out of the clutches of Khamenei, Ebrahim Raisi, and the IRGC.

The NCRI Labor Committee calls on the International Labor Organization and other relevant bodies of the United Nations and all trade unions and syndicates around the world to condemn the anti-labor policies of the ruling mullahs and their gross and systematic violation of international laws and standards related to workers.

National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)

Labor Committee

August 4, 2022

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