Post by 1949 on May 18, 2005 17:54:30 GMT -5
Iran Arabs in revolt against regime
2 May 2005. A World to Win News Service. Following is a slightly edited 21 April statement by the Communist Party of Iran (Marxist-Leninist-Maoist concerning an uprising in Khuzestan, a province in south-western Iran bordering Iraq, where Iran’s Arab minority (as opposed to Persians, the dominant nationality) are concentrated. As of early May, the Iranian regime was conducting a reign of terror in the region, including house-to-house searches. Communications have been cut off. The Internet was opened up for one day, then closed down again. The city of Ahvaz is now under the control of the regime, but many residents predict that the protests will break out again.
The Arab people of Ahvaz and several other cities of Khuzestan rose up in protest against the anti-Arab policies of the Islamic regime of Iran on 15 April. These protests are still going on in scattered forms like burning banks and government buildings. Following the outbreak, the oppressive forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran came to the scene and fired on the people. So far 40 have been killed and 300 injured. More than 1,000 people have been arrested. Ahvaz is now an occupied city. The security forces and Pasdaran (the so-called revolutionary guards) in many cities and towns in Khuzestan have been reinforced and adopted a more open presence in order to harass the Arab and also non-Arab peoples.
These protests were sparked by a letter written by a high regime official describing a proposed policy of reducing the proportion of Arabs in Khuzestan’s cities. This top-secret letter was leaked and widely distributed in Arab populated areas, and the media of the Arab countries of the Gulf gave it much publicity. In reaction, the infuriated people poured into streets shouting anti-regime slogans. Among other things, they denounced what they called “the occupation of Arabestan” (Khuzestan) and called for its independence.
Whether this letter is real or fake is not important, since such a rebellion would have broken out sooner or later anyway. This revolt is a just answer to the 26 years of oppression imposed by Iran’s fascist religious regime. Ever since it first seized power, the Islamic Republic wielded its swords, the army and the Pasdaran against the oppressed minority peoples and nations of Iran. This regime consolidated by suppressing the Arabs of Khuzestan, the Turkmen Sahra region in the north of the country, and Kurdistan. It has regularly suppressed the rest of the people and used the force of arms to snatch away all the achievements that the workers, peasants, women, minority peoples and intellectuals had gained as a result of their struggle against the Shah’s regime and his US masters.
This regime has even deprived the oppressed nations of their cultures. The Islamic regime spreads superstitious nonsense and religious garbage in Arabic all across the country, and the main language of its highest religious school in Qom is Arabic, but it does not allow the children of the Arab people to study in their own language!
The Arab people in Iran live in poverty while the great wealth just a few steps away from them is stolen by world capitalism. This enormous gap is a burning wound, and the Islamic Republic has been pouring salt in it for 26 years. Just like the Shah’s regime before it and Arab monarchies like Saudi Arabia and the Emirate regimes in the Gulf, the Islamic Republic has served as an oil broker for world capitalism. In this way they have fattened the thousand-fold families of the mullahs and the heads of the Pasdaran, Basij (militia) and Jihad Sazandegi (the regime organ in charge of the so-called reconstruction of the country after the Iran-Iraq War) and kept the country backward and in deprivation. It is partners such as these that make it possible for the world’s powers to plunder the fruits of the labour of the region’s people. The world powers use the armies and security forces of these reactionary regimes to suppress the people of this region.
2 May 2005. A World to Win News Service. Following is a slightly edited 21 April statement by the Communist Party of Iran (Marxist-Leninist-Maoist concerning an uprising in Khuzestan, a province in south-western Iran bordering Iraq, where Iran’s Arab minority (as opposed to Persians, the dominant nationality) are concentrated. As of early May, the Iranian regime was conducting a reign of terror in the region, including house-to-house searches. Communications have been cut off. The Internet was opened up for one day, then closed down again. The city of Ahvaz is now under the control of the regime, but many residents predict that the protests will break out again.
The Arab people of Ahvaz and several other cities of Khuzestan rose up in protest against the anti-Arab policies of the Islamic regime of Iran on 15 April. These protests are still going on in scattered forms like burning banks and government buildings. Following the outbreak, the oppressive forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran came to the scene and fired on the people. So far 40 have been killed and 300 injured. More than 1,000 people have been arrested. Ahvaz is now an occupied city. The security forces and Pasdaran (the so-called revolutionary guards) in many cities and towns in Khuzestan have been reinforced and adopted a more open presence in order to harass the Arab and also non-Arab peoples.
These protests were sparked by a letter written by a high regime official describing a proposed policy of reducing the proportion of Arabs in Khuzestan’s cities. This top-secret letter was leaked and widely distributed in Arab populated areas, and the media of the Arab countries of the Gulf gave it much publicity. In reaction, the infuriated people poured into streets shouting anti-regime slogans. Among other things, they denounced what they called “the occupation of Arabestan” (Khuzestan) and called for its independence.
Whether this letter is real or fake is not important, since such a rebellion would have broken out sooner or later anyway. This revolt is a just answer to the 26 years of oppression imposed by Iran’s fascist religious regime. Ever since it first seized power, the Islamic Republic wielded its swords, the army and the Pasdaran against the oppressed minority peoples and nations of Iran. This regime consolidated by suppressing the Arabs of Khuzestan, the Turkmen Sahra region in the north of the country, and Kurdistan. It has regularly suppressed the rest of the people and used the force of arms to snatch away all the achievements that the workers, peasants, women, minority peoples and intellectuals had gained as a result of their struggle against the Shah’s regime and his US masters.
This regime has even deprived the oppressed nations of their cultures. The Islamic regime spreads superstitious nonsense and religious garbage in Arabic all across the country, and the main language of its highest religious school in Qom is Arabic, but it does not allow the children of the Arab people to study in their own language!
The Arab people in Iran live in poverty while the great wealth just a few steps away from them is stolen by world capitalism. This enormous gap is a burning wound, and the Islamic Republic has been pouring salt in it for 26 years. Just like the Shah’s regime before it and Arab monarchies like Saudi Arabia and the Emirate regimes in the Gulf, the Islamic Republic has served as an oil broker for world capitalism. In this way they have fattened the thousand-fold families of the mullahs and the heads of the Pasdaran, Basij (militia) and Jihad Sazandegi (the regime organ in charge of the so-called reconstruction of the country after the Iran-Iraq War) and kept the country backward and in deprivation. It is partners such as these that make it possible for the world’s powers to plunder the fruits of the labour of the region’s people. The world powers use the armies and security forces of these reactionary regimes to suppress the people of this region.