On Monday, February 16, Tehran's bus drivers stopped work and assembled in the main headquarters of the Sherkat-e Vahed (Tehran's public transport company). The strike in protest to non-payment of the workers' salaries and bonuses, has disrupted Tehran's public transportation.
Workers are also on strike at Tehran's Ala'eddin Company. For the last three years, the workers at this company have suffered from economic hardships. They receive very small wages and do not receive any non-cash fringe benefits.
The strike by workers at Melli shoe factory in west Tehran has been continuing for more than one month.
Also on Monday, February 18, cement-transport truck drivers in Kerman, southern Iran, went on strike in protest to the regime's extortion. Officials intended to impose parking fees on the drivers. But the drivers defied the mullahs' actions and clashed with the Guards dispatched to quell their protest. Fearing the consequences, the mullahs' regime was forced to cancel the parking fees.
In Saravan, in the southeastern Iranian province of Sistan and Baluchistan, Macaroni Factory workers staged a strike to protest the non-payment of their salaries and bonuses.
On Sunday, government agents roughed up and arrested a businessman at Isfahan's bazaar. The action prompted shop owners to close their shops in protest; major parts of the bazaar were closed down.
The NCR's Labor Committee draws the attention of international human rights organizations, particularly those concerned with the rights of the workers, to the precarious plight of Iranian workers and urges them to intervene to improve this situation and save the lives of those arrested in these strikes.
Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran
February 18, 1998
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