For Ahmad Shaamloo

We salute Shahin Najafi!

Where should the Iranian left stand?

Excerpts:

It is now clearer than ever that the opposition movement in Iran has two heads. One is the official loyal opposition within the regime, the reformists, and the other is the opposition movement of the people on the streets, which has its own diversity of lines of thinking.

The opposition movement among the people is clearly more radical and is determined to go much farther than the Mousavi-Khatami-Karroubi faction and their cohorts will ever, EVER be willing to go. In all this, we must not forget that Rafsanjani is a third column within the regime, and has his own agenda.

The loyal opposition has made it clear that for them it is all about the 'elections', and they dare not mention the fact that a majority of the Iranian people want nothing short of a replacement of theocracy with something more humane and more democratic.

For the people, the 'elections' were merely an excuse to take to the streets, both before and after the voting day, which, to their shock, turned out to have been an elaborate final stage of an electoral coup.

[...]

* * *

In the meantime, in order to give some clarity to the objectives of the movement, and in order to delineate those demarcation lines that would help prevent a repeat of the fate of the 1978 revolution -- during which the Islamists succeeded in keeping people's demands vague, under such slogans as, 'Everybody together!' (Hameh baa ham!), and were thusly able to hijack the revolution after the Shah's overthrow -- it is necessary to raise some minimum demands that clarify where the left must stand, and to help differentiate various segments of this movement in relation to the overall demands of the movement. To clarify the left's position does not mean abandoning unity of action. But, unity of action based on vague and undifferentiated demands can only lead to another disaster and the hijacking of this movement by one of the factions of the regime.

So, here are some demands that should be raised loudly, for the current movement to have realistic chances of success in bringing a degree of social justice to Iran:

* Immediate and unconditional abolition of executions and of death penalty
* Immediate abolition of torture and the freeing of all political prisoners
* Immediate access of international human rights organizations to political prisoners
* Freedom to strike
* Abolition of theocracy
* Unconditional freedom of expression, thought and clothing
* Freedom of the press and access to media by all
* Freedom of assembly and political organizations and parties
* Establishment of a Constituent Assembly after an appropriate period of discussion among the people (at least 9 months to a year)
* Equality of all the rights of all the people
* Separation of state from religion and ideology
* Establishment of a minimum wage
* Limiting of the ratio between the maximum income and minimum wages
* The right to employment for all adults seeking work
* Social security and medical insurance for all
* Housing for all
* The right and opportunity to education for all
* The right to bilingual elementary education where applicable (in minority communities)
* Use of oil revenues to furnish the costs for the above, and until such time that the national economy has been rebuilt based on internal needs and has become independent of oil and gas revenues
* Establishment of principle of autonomy in running the local affairs of minority communities (Kurds, Turkmen, Baluchi's, Arabs, Azeri's)
* Establishment of local and national councils (city councils, homemakers' councils, workers' and peasants' councils, trade councils, etc.) for:
- Participation in the writing of a new constitution
- Management of local affairs
* Reduction of workweek to 32 hours
* Childcare centers near work places
* Abolition of the use of military or paramilitary forces against the people
* Abolition of forced marriage, and Siqeh (temporary marriage)
* Abolition of physical or mental punishment at home, school and the society at large
* Urgent action to clean up and protect the environment

More can be added to this list, of course; but the important point is to clarify what the Iranian left must stand for. Let us hope that this movement for fundamental change will not be derailed and hijacked once again by the people living upstairs.

Read the complete article here ... 

International Solidarity with Iranian People

This slideshow is from Revolutionary Road.

RELATED:
Statement of Independent Union of Print Shop Workers of Tehran to
July 25 International Day of Solidarity Rallies
[Thanks to Steve Zeltzer for sending this!]

Excerpts:
brothers and sisters:

on the occasion of iran solidarity day, we men and women members of the independent union of printshop workers of tehran (iupwt), would like to extend to you, halfway across the globe, our deep appreciation for your support and solidarity with our cause.
[...]
our union, iupwt, is centered on a number of large and mostly state- or semi-state-owned enterprises accounting for the bulk of the books and print media published in the capitol. because of the harsh police conditions imposed against labor organizing, our union activists and the workers who support us have to operate under the constant threat of arrest, imprisonment in solitary conditions, physical and mental abuse, and dismissal from work. at the time of rising unemployment, the least of these measures, dismissal from work, could have devastating effect on our workers and their families. these are illegal acts that are even against the iranian regime's own constitution, not to mention all the international covenants to which the iranian government is a signatory.

as you all well know, the courage of our people, especially its young, has permanently transformed iran into a new country. there is mass repression going on against our people but the dictatorship has lost its aura of invincibility and its mystique of superior other-worldly power. and for the first time in more than a generation, there is hope again in the country. [...]

dear friends, at this point, allow us to speak freely to you. there are some dangerous misconceptions about the democratic movement in iran that must be addressed urgently:

one of these misconceptions is that the green wave movement is a rich man's movement, whereas mahmood ahmadinejad's government is a pro-working class and pro-poor people's movement headed by a humble man of the people. this is a gross and blatant lie. our movement is supported by millions of the poor and the working people. ahmadinejad is a demagogue who has surrounded himself with ex-revolutionary guards, present-day multi-millionaires who care absolutely nothing for the poor.

if he is pro-working class, why did he want to end 70% of all subsidies last year? why did he change the labor law against the workers' interests? why does he systematically arrest, imprison and torture labor activists? this is an insult to the working people of iran that they support a petty dictator because he has bought them off by cash hand-outs and free footstuff at election time.

ahmadinejad is as much a progressive man of the people as mussolini was pro-working class and anti-capitalist. [...]

we suspect that this myth is bought by those in the worldwide progressive movement that automatically assume anybody who stands up or pretends to stand up to the american empire must be a noble nationalist. to these friends, we must say that anti-americanism is just a fig leaf for the most reactionary and obscurantist forces in iran who need it to hide their deeds, namely, their incompetence, their theft of national property and their repression against their own people and their personal enrichment in the name of religion. if mr. khamenei has benefited the progressive anti-imperialist cause anywhere, it has been out of opportunism and nothing else!
[...]

Read the complete statement here ...

July 25: Global Day of Solidarity with Iranian People

Rallies and demonstrations planned in more than 100 cities worldwide.

Iran's Absolutist Dictatorship Reloaded

"Look! How many times do I have to tell you; God chose ME! Nobody else counts!"

This is a good one. Not that it is news for real leftists who have stood with the people, but it should be for those who, for years, and especially since Ahmadinejad's presidency, which, if anything, has intensified the oppression in Iran both politico-culturally and economically, have been praising the 'Islamic democracy' in Iran ... That is, for people like that unforgivable editor at MRZine, who on her own blog has said things like, "At least you [Iranians] have a republic" (sic.), and who has been disseminating the theocrats' propaganda so much so that now the official news agency of these religious dictators regurgitates articles posted by MRZine for their propaganda purposes.  

So, anyway, here it is: Khamenei orders Iran vice president sacked!

As in, no matter how slavishly you kiss the Supreme (sic.) Leader's hands -- or, if you're Ahmadinejad, other obligatory body parts -- as the 'elected' president, as the supposedly independent chief-executive of a supposedly independent branch of the government, you don't even get to choose your own assistants.

If even the 'elected' president cannot act independently in choosing a relatively minor figure (in the overall frame of the current setup) for his cabinet, is it any wonder that the regime has reacted with such extreme brutality against the millions of people who took to the streets to demand accountability from the entire state?

'Democracy'? Republic? NOT!! More like ... well, more like a Khalifate, or Sultanate, or, why use fancy words, a one-man absolutist dictatorship.

More to the point, super conservative cleric Ayatollah Yazdi threw all 'republican' pretenses to the winds and said outright that the regime receives its legitimacy from god (see here also for an interesting commentary in Farsi), not from the people. People only provide 'popularity' (IF the Supreme Leader agrees with their choice, that is).  

In other words, the ideas, thoughts, social needs and demands of the people who do all the work, who produce all the wealth, provide all the services ... they just have nothing to do with the legitimacy of the government. They only bring the government 'popularity', which is quite a superfluous quality. 

Just as in the 'elections' in this system, where the Supreme Leader (through the Guardian Council) selects the menu from which people may decide which one is best for them (not that their decision means anything, anyway, as we've seen in this presidential 'elections'), god in turn chooses who must be his divine representative on earth, and the people, if they act correctly, better go along with that divine decision. Otherwise, it follows naturally, and if they choose wrong, they are blasphemers and apostates, and deserving of senseless beatings, torture, rape and murder.

And the fact that god has chosen such fascistic, anti-humane bunch of thugs to represent the divine will ... well, you can fill in the rest. 

These guys are literally saying that they stand for god on earth, so the poor people who are trapped in this geographic boundary called Iran, their wishes and needs have no place in this system. That's about as clear as it can get. Now, if that is not blasphemy, I don't know what would count as such (if you're religious, that is). 

And for the tens of millions of Iranians who are not religious to such a fanatical degree, and want nothing of sorts ruling over them with such extreme intrusiveness as they have been experiencing for thirty years, well, the insult is absolute, yet not surprising at all. For thirty years, we have been saying exactly the same thing, with, of course, the opposite intention: there is no 'republic' in the 'Islamic Republic'. When you have a one-man-decides-all type of system, where does the 'republic' fit in? It doesn't, and now the world knows it, too. (The unblind world, that is.)

The fact that American left is split between the blind (the Stalinist binary left, the left that just can't see reality no matter how clearly and forcefully reality presents itself) and the unblind (among the labor movement, and the real radicals) over what to do regarding the current historical movement of the Iranian people for their rights, for freedom and social justice (none of these apparently mean anything anymore to a whole bunch of American 'leftists') ... this is a tragic commentary about the state of affairs in the U.S. left, and is exactly one of the major reasons why the U.S. imperialism has such a free hand in doing whatever it bloody wants. 

But, fortunately, for the Iranian people there is no confusion. They know what they are facing, and they have finally decided enough is ENOUGH! 

Long live the people's movement for democracy and social justice! 

Down with theocracy! 

Power to the people, no delay! 

RELATED:
Iranian moderate: Our security agents are 'worse than Zionists' (Reuters; July 25, 2009)

Arrests and Deaths Continue in Iran

From Amnesty International. 

One note though: the list of those killed runs waaaaay longer than suggested. There have been at least 65 identified deaths so far. For a more complete list, please see here.

ARRESTS AND DEATHS CONTINUE IN IRAN AS AUTHORITIES TIGHTEN GRIP
22 July 2009

Reports from Tehran on Tuesday, said that security forces deployed excessive use of force to counter peaceful demonstrations in Haft Tir Square, where more arrests were said to have been made. This news is, according to Amnesty International, a jarring reminder to the international community that the waves of arrests and killings continue unabated in Iran, as the authorities tighten their grip.

Thirty-six Iranian army officers are among people reported to have been arrested recently in connection with the disputed presidential election in Iran. Amnesty International has received the names of 24 of them.

Others reported to have been arrested in recent days include political activists, journalists, academics and lawyers. Amnesty International said it fears for their safety in detention, as torture or other ill-treatment of detainees is common in Iran.

According to media reports, the military officers planned to attend the Friday prayer sermon in Tenrah on 17 July, led by former president Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. They planned to do so while wearing their military uniforms as an act of political defiance.

The gesture was said to be intended to express solidarity with the demonstrators protesting against the official but widely disputed presidential election result.

Ayatollah Rafsanjani, who supported the campaign of presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, expressed concern in his sermon at the handling of complaints regarding the election by the Guardian Council, and called for the release of all those detained following the protests and an end to media restrictions.

Hundreds - possibly thousands - of people have been detained for protesting against the official election result. Many are held in undisclosed locations across Iran.

Mostafa Tajzadeh, arrested on 16 June, unlike some other detainees, has not yet been allowed to call his family, nor have they been able to obtain any information concerning his whereabouts from the Iranian authorities.

Bijan Khajehpour Khoei, a business and economic consultant, was arrested on 27 June at Tehran airport when he arrived back from a trip to Vienna and London. During his brief trip abroad, he spoke to trade officials in Vienna and met the Iran British Business Chamber in London, as part of his work to support Iranian business and encourage foreign investment in Iran. His whereabouts are also unknown and his family fear for his health as he is diabetic.

Possibly as many as 197 protestors were arrested on 9 July at a demonstration marking the tenth anniversary of 18 Tir, the suppression of student-led protests in 1999, in which at least one student was killed and many others were tortured or otherwise ill-treated. The police say that about 40 demonstrators were arrested at the 9 July protest.

Dr Sheikh Hassan Aghaei, a journalist from Iran's Kurdish minority and a political cartoonist, was detained in Mahabad, northwest Iran at 11am on 18 July by plain-clothes security officials who may be affiliated to the Revolutionary Guards, and transferred to an unknown location. No reason has been given for his arrest but he had been involved in campaign activities for Mir Hossein Mousavi.

Lawyer and human rights activist, Shadi Sadr, was violently arrested in Tehran on the morning of 17 July on her way to prayers.

Read the complete report here ...

Khiaban No. 26: 'Return to Law' Or Create New Laws?

Thanks to the sender! This is a translation of a lead article from issue number 26 of Khiaban newspaper. To get electronic copies of the paper in Persian, write to: khyaboon@gmail.com

For reports of resistance as well as details of those detained, murdered and disappeared, in English, go to Revolutionary Road ... and to Iranian.com. 

Return to Law Or Create New Laws?
Amir K.
Khiaban # 26 / Saturday, July 18, 2009

Yesterday, the city [of Tehran's] streets belonged to the people once again. Rafsanjani's leading of the Friday prayer [at Tehran University] became an excuse for mass gatherings and demonstrations in the city. On route to and from the Tehran University, from the early morning till long after dark, Tehran's streets were witness to huge and united crowds, who had opened a way through the shields and the truncheons, and filled the hot summer air with their slogans.

It is now more than a month that the streets have become the most important arena for struggle, changing hands in turns between the dissenting people and, on the other hand, the oppressive forces of the regime. At times, the people take back the control of the streets, at other times death squads have established their reign over the streets. The system knows that, to consolidate a new era of sinister rule, it must control the streets just like before the electoral coup; and the people too know that, in order to put an end to decades of tyranny, discrimination and inequality, they must make the city streets their own. The end result of this fateful fight will determine the people's future life. So, it is not without reason that the people, holding their heads high and ready for death, with steadfast steps and smiling lips, are confronting the darkest and the bloodiest regime of the era. The rhythms of the accelerated waves of their movement has compacted their social history, and the seeds of their hopes and anticipations in mere moments have already turned into healthy saplings standing tall.

In the Friday prayer sermon [of July 17th], Rafsanjani did not stand with the organizers of the coup. But, did he stand with the people? His suggested solution was to return to law. This demand, however, has no relation to the current demands of the people. Interesting how the fundamentalists too invite the reformists to submit to the law, and claim that Mousavi and his cohorts refuse to accept the legal institutions (particularly the Interior Ministry and the Guardian Council).

The truth is that the people, as a result of the experience of their glorious confrontation against the coup, have discovered that countless existing laws are in contradiction with a just and dignified life. In the very widespread presence of the people in the streets yesterday, once again vast numbers of people were subject to beatings, large-scale arrests, and reports of guns firing [at people] have been published. People are being oppressed by institutions, which gain their legitimacy from the existing laws. For the people, the opportunity for public assembly to dissent and protest is a right, and they are furious over the violent answer of the regime to dissent. Some have even come to the protests with placards displaying parts of an article of the constitution guaranteeing the freedom of assembly and peaceful demonstration by any group. However, these placards usually skip the rest of this article, which clarifies: "Unless it is against Islamic principles." And by reading the constitution more carefully, we see that according to the existing laws, in effect the regime has the option to decide which assemblies are against the [Islamic] principles and which ones are not.

As a result, when the murderous coup regime speaks of the illegality of the recent demonstrations, they are not far off the mark. For the current laws sanction a small minority, hovering above the people and beyond their oversight, to [legally] crush any opponents. However, although the behavior of the coup regime may even have a standing on the basis of the current national legal system, it has become clear for everyone that these laws are not based on justice, but are simply tools at the service of injustice and brutality against the society.

The people have entered the arena to reclaim their rights, and if there exists contradictions between the laws and the social rights [of the people], people are demanding the laws to be changed and want to create new laws that recognize and protect their rights. 'Returning to law', from the people's point of view, is nothing but a return to 30-year old subjugation. People have taken to the streets in order to create free political spaces. They are fighting for the creation of new social laws. And this goal cannot be achieved but through the destruction of an oppressive and anti-human legal system, and the creation of a new set of laws based on citizens' rights, freedom and social justice.

Against a new wave of crackdown and oppression in Iran

This statement is from issue number 24 of Khiaban newspaper. Thanks to the sender!
To receive electronic copies of the paper in Persian, write to: khyaboon@gmail.com

Joint statement: against a new wave of crackdown and oppression in Iran

Khiaban #24 / Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Struggling people of Iran, freedom-loving peoples of the world!

The act of millions of demonstrators who took to the streets recently in most cities in Iran was a huge show of power by a people challenging the injustice, deceit and the constant oppression of this regime. A challenge that was answered by the exercise of violence by the anti-democratic system of the Islamic Republic and its security forces. Up to now, we have had definite reports of tens of deaths and hundreds of injured. Available reports tell of thousands of detained or disappeared among the activists and dissidents against the regime. Meanwhile, the university dormitories have been among the first targets of the forces of oppression, leading to tens of deaths and innumerable arrests of students. The widespread wave of nightly raids and arrests in the homes of the youth, journalists and students, and the disappearance of others remind us of the fear and the terror during the 1980s. The masses of the detained, in addition to being sent to known prisons such as Evin or Gohardasht or ... are being sent to military bases, Basij offices and unknown locations.

Despite the severe censorship, the reports, pictures and videos that have been sent out are incontrovertible documents indicating that the dimensions of the tortures, the ruthlessness and cruelty of the torturers have reached unimaginable levels in the Islamic Republic. The beatings, throwing the detainees and the prisoners from elevated heights while blindfolded and with hands tied, along with other unbearable psychological and physical tortures -- all these have given a heavier bulk to the Islamic Republic's files on violations of human rights. The well-established methods of creating fear among the people, of constant attrition-by-torture of the prisoners to force "confessions" from them for televised interviews -- these are among the crimes that these days can be seen on a vast scale. Prisoners are tortured around the clock, day and night, in order to break them and, despite their will and wishes, to force "confessions" that fly in the face of their lives, their values and aspirations. We declare unambiguously that forcing prisoners to give dictated "confessions" has no [legal] validity, and can only be used as hard evidence against the Islamic Republic regime, which has placed such interviewee under harsh pressure and torture.

The families of the detained, without any news of their children and relatives, have no channel for pursuing their cases and for clarifying the situation and fate of their loved ones. Disturbing news pertaining to the killing and the secret burials of detainees have raised the concerns of the families and spread wider an atmosphere of fear and terror in the society. The efforts of mothers of the recently detained in finding their children by repeated gatherings have been countered by the arrests of family members by the regime. Street killings and kidnappings are currently on the agenda of the regime's security forces, and we face the dangerous beginnings of systematic and widespread executions. The regime is pursuing a ruthless, systematic and planned crackdown on the active and persistent opposition; a trend, which without widespread protests in Iran and the world, can turn into extensive killings by the regime at any moment.

A number of the signers of this statement are political prisoners, who experienced harsh prison lives and tortures in the 1980s. Many of us are survivors and witnesses to the killings of 1981 and 1988. And for this reason, we can be sure that the dimensions of the crackdown, torture and the killings go much farther than indicated in the reports made available to the public. Bearing these reasons in mind, we demand immediate, widespread and multilateral action against the current situation in the prisons and the torture chambers in Iran. Let us hope that international efforts, as well as efforts by Iranians outside the country, will be a worthy reflection of the current sensitive situation.

Along with alerting Amnesty International and the International [Committee of the] Red Cross regarding the repetition of another crime against humanity, we ask these institutions to use all their capabilities to stop the repetition of such crimes, and to visit all the official and unofficial [secret] prisons of the Islamic Republic regime, and to spare no efforts in saving the prisoners' lives.

--We demand the unconditional freedom of all political prisoners, and the banning of any form of torture in prisons.

--We demand the unconditional banning of death penalty in Iran.

Freedom loving people! Come and let us use all our resources in an effort to free the political prisoners. We, former political prisoners of the Islamic Republic regime, in support of the freedom struggles of the people and the freedom of all political prisoners, and in particular those detained in the recent events, and in order to prevent widespread mass killings, on July 24th and 25th, will conduct a hunger strike in Berlin, Germany. We ask all freedom loving political activists, organizations, institutions and the defenders of human rights to participate in this strike and play a role in preventing yet another round of mass killings.

For a list of signers (in Farsi) see here ...

Khiaban No. 23: Local Solidarity Committees

Thanks to the sender of this translation of a lead article from issue number 23 of Khiaban newspaper, published in Iran. To get electronic copies of the paper in Persian, write to: khyaboon@gmail.com

For reports of resistance as well as details of those detained, murdered and disappeared, in English, go to Revolutionary Road ...

Local Solidarity Committees Against the Coup
by Amir K.
Khiaban #23 / Tuesday, July 14, 2009

How can we confront the coup? One alternative being spoken of with lots of fanfare is to keep our gaze an those above: [they say] let's just wait for Mousavi and Karoubi and their fellows to form a political front, and then let's wait some more to see what actions they propose. Or else, let's put all our efforts into getting the U.N. and the developed nations to reject this coup regime and force them into accepting to hold free elections. Or else, let's just keep staring at the TV screen or the YouTube videos, waiting for them to tell us what to do. This alternative puts its prayers in the 'greats' and the 'experts'; 'great' people whose source of 'greatness' is far from clear. Have they earned their greatness in a struggle for people's crushed dreams; or have they earned greatness through owning pistachio orchards, large import-export companies, daily presence on the television networks, long history of service in the Sepaah [revolutionary guards], blood connection to this or that ayatollah, and on and on?

In such alternatives, where are the people? Is it possible to change the current unjust social relations based on prejudice, without people creating new social relations through their struggle? Is it possible to act like a television audience and [expect to] create a humane government? Can we really keep our eyes fixed on those above and wait to see what conclusions are reached in Mousavi and Karoubi meeting, or what Rafsanjani will say in the Friday prayers?

But, another alternative does exist. Decentralized and spontaneous forms of people's organizations have created a much more powerful movement, which -- regardless of Obama's reactions and irrespective of whether the reformists in the regime stand with people or stick to their own interests -- has united to defeat the coup regime, and has put its trust in the power of the people. This alternative should be supported and participated in actively.

Local solidarity committees against the coup can be one of the forms carrying the task of joining all the forces and the abilities of every single individual, people who pay the biggest price for the [current] social existence. This movement can transform the citizens from being victims of this regime of velayat-e faqih into free and equal citizens of a people's governance.

By forming committees made up of men and women, of young and the middle aged, in places of living and neighborhoods, we can defend ourselves against the coup, and fight them with a bigger force. These committees can put to good use the variety of capabilities of their members and create a collective force. In these committees, different methods of resisting the coup can be discussed and collective decisions can be reached. We can discuss what kinds of slogans to raise and how to participate in protests. Some members of the committees can gather a collection of news and analysis and pass them on to other members and their neighbors, and even put them up in public places. If a family member of a committee affiliate is among the latest detainees or the disappeared, we can help them either legally, or financially, or even by providing them with a car, a ride, etc. The youth can discuss slogan writing [on the walls] in the adjacent neighborhoods, and find suitable ways for it. We can give spiritual support to those who have experienced soul crushing events. In working class neighborhoods, workers can discuss issues relating to mass dissent in factories and workshops out of the reach of the company officials and the foremen.

We cannot and must not limit ourselves to the slogans and demands available on the [mainstream/official] media. We can unite around real demands and daily problems. In their fight to gain back their rights, girls and women -- who in their places of work, face sexual harassment, discrimination, having to endure unbearable working conditions, unequal payment and rights, and other such obstacles that prevent them from a life of freedom and dignity -- can use these committees to find people with similar thoughts and can then act collectively.

Those who, in the current system, in order to make a living, have to leave the house at five in the morning and don't get back home until well into the dark of the night, can unite together to stop this death machine, which has destroyed their lives. In these committees it can be learned that we do have rights, and how we do have our own thoughts: whether about our daily problems or about big subject matters such as the running of the state, the running of the prisons and the courts and the police, and about the workings of the television and the newspapers.

This limited [ruling] minority, which in broad daylight and in opposition to demands for the citizens' human rights, resorts to cheating, lying and killing, has zero right or legitimacy in deciding our fate.

People's solidarity against the coup is not a 'plan'; rather, it is a reality, a reaction that has already started among the people, exactly because the coup has stood for the absolute abolition of people's rights. Ordinary people have shown and will show the most steadfast resistance, exactly because they are fighting for their lives, for a dignified living, which has come under attack by the rulers.

Khiaban No. 22: People's Organization

Thanks to the sender of this translation of a lead article from issue number 22 of Khiaban newspaper, published in Iran. To get electronic copies of the paper in Persian, write to: khyaboon@gmail.com

For detailed reports of detained, murdered and disappeared, in English, go to Revolutionary Road ...

People's Organization
Amir K.
Khiaban #22/ July 13, 2009

Thirty days have passed since what they called the presidential elections. Thirty compact days, during which in tandem with the terror, the bullets, torture and the regimes lies, the collective consciousness and awareness of the people have developed and morphed. The true nature of the Islamic Republic and its anti-human laws and regulations has been exposed to all, and people have discovered the power of their numbers and their togetherness.

Those wisps of illusion that had forced many into sweet thoughts of step-by-step change have been blown away, and the flames of awakening have spread across the rooftops in the country. In their fight against the coup regime, people have come to see the deep contradiction between a system based on velayat-e faqih [guardianship/rule of religious jurist] and a popular system based on people's will. When their singing throats became the targets of the regime's bullets, the people saw the anti-human nature of the Sepaah [Revolutionary Guards] and the Basij. People found out all about the regime's daily, hidden crimes, when it became apparent to all that their social wealth has been spent to procure the latest and most sophisticated instruments of police oppression, and the most technologically advanced know-how at the service of spying and controlling the citizens.

Kamenei issued the command for the killings, and every day since a new corpse is handed to yet another grieving yet rage filled family opposing them. That inept clown, Ahmadinejad, talked of freedom, while thousands of the country's youth were lined in death camps, awaiting to receive their daily dose of torture. That regime wrote illusory letters to their promised Mehdi the messiah, while the nation's mothers in search of their disappeared children in the corridors of the Islamic halls of justice were insulted, and saw the catastrophe of the events in their shaken hopes.

This consciousness has grown and a collectivity has made it impossible to breath the suffocating air any more. To make the passage from consciousness to proactive action, to go from understanding the oppressive, unjust and corrupt social relations to changing those relations and building a just, free and equal society -- this passage is dependent on organization. Let them speak of easy solutions for change, those who are horrified of the people's power, and those who have tied their hopes to the replacement of a layer of today's rulers with a layer of tomorrow's rulers. Leave them with their dreams and ideas such as a Green TV station that would remote control the people from afar, and render them into political observers, not actors.

However, the people who did not remain mere observers of the coup and intervened in their fate with their own lives if need be, are marching far ahead of the colored dreams of that crowd. The people have realized that to overthrow this organized injustice, they need their own organization. An organization that, unlike the party suggested by Mousavi, will not submit to an existence in the poisoned crevices of the coup regime's laws, but an organization that will grow in order to smash open the cracks in the system and reach the air of freedom.

A large people's organization is an association of small organizations, which sprout and gather strength from within the heart of the struggle against the coup, and which will guarantee the people's rule by defeating this anti-human system.

Khiaban No. 21: Death dawns on unofficial camps in Iran

Thanks to the sender of this translation of an article from issue number 21 of Khiaban newspaper, published in Iran. (To get electronic copies of the paper in Persian, write to: khyaboon@gmail.com)

For detailed reports of detained, murdered and disappeared, in English, go to Revolutionary Road ...

Clearing Out Evin: Death dawns on unofficial camps
Khiaban #21/Sunday, July 12, 2009

Worrying reports are being heard from the prisons. Yesterday, we reported on the murder of a detainee in Evin prison [in Tehran]. Sohrab A'arabi's murder is but a small indication of the calamity in the regime's death camps. In the wake of the Khamenei-Ahmadinejad coup, thousands have been detained and disappeared, and nothing is known about their fate. The Islamic regime, in early 1980s too set out on a mass killing spree in the prisons. Pictures painted by the recently released detainees are identical to those described in the prison diaries of the 1980s. Cells and the corridors overflowing with detainees, horrible tortures, devoured bodies, blood everywhere.

Prisons are crammed with the youth and the dissidents who would not surrender to a regime of fear and terror, and are singing mythic songs of resistance. May embraces of solidarity rain on those singing lips. Never before has the freedom of the individual been so tied to the freedom of all.

The latest news gathered by the Khiaban newspaper indicates that the Evin prison is undergoing a clearing out. Fearing the possibility of having to accept a delegation visiting the prison, and the exposure of the severity of the tortures and the ruthlessness of the regime, has caused them to transfer in a hurry those who have been subjected to horrid tortures, to secret and unofficial detention centers.

One of the most important of these death camps is Kahrizak camp, which is referred to as the 'slaughterhouse', and is one of the innovations of the ruling fascism, and which reminds one of a model of Nazi death camps. In this camp are kept numerous of the disappeared and the youth arrested in the street demonstrations; treated utterly inhumanly and tortured to the point of death.

Some families of the detained are trying to get their loved ones released from the claws of the fascists by writing letters to authorities scared into silence, by haggling over their release. But, it must be said that people have realized well in the last month that their most important power in confronting the regime is their solidarity and collective action. Whether they have family members in detention or not, people must initiate collective actions in order to gain the freedom of their loved ones. We must put an end to this naked violence and brutality. Mass and widespread rallies and demonstrations are the people's most important and effective tools in forcing the release of the recent detainees. It is possible that some of the famous detainees may have invisible support in the prisons of this murderous regime. But the ordinary people do not have any support other than their own arms joined together, their voices in harmony. Let us get prepared for a united effort for demolishing the torture and killings in the prisons.

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