Frightened leaders of Iran beat up union organizer

Amir Taheri:

ONE of Iran's most popular civil-society leaders was ab ducted in Tehran on Tues day after chairing a meeting of trade unionists.

Mansour Osanloo, the 48-year-old president of the Union of Bus Drivers (SKSV), had just stepped off a bus when a group of bearded men emerged from a gray Peugeot and attacked him with clubs and knuckle-dusters.

Shouting, "You are an enemy of Islam," the attackers pushed him into the car and drove away. Witnesses said Osanloo was severely beaten, and his attackers continued to beat him even after they had forced him into their car.

Passengers on the bus, which had halted, tried to restrain the attackers but were held back at gunpoint.

Osanloo's friends and relatives say that secret-service agents had followed him round the clock since his return from Europe last month. On that visit, he addressed a number of international labor meetings in London, Brussels and Geneva.

In 2004, Osanloo helped create one of the first independent trade unions in Iran since the mullahs' 1979 seizure of power. He has led two successful transit-worker strikes, forcing the state-owned bus company to offer concessions.

Other workers have followed his example, creating over 400 independent trade unions with an estimated 1.5 million members. Earlier this year, the independent unions set up the Workers' Organizations and Activists Coordinating Council (WOACC) to foster unity of action. On May 1 (International Labor Day) the WOACC held the first independent workers' marches in Tehran and 11 other major cities since 1979.

Osanloo, regarded by some as "Iran's Lech Walesa," has been abducted by paramilitaries working for the government before. He's also been imprisoned twice, including a spell at Evin, the dreaded "Islamic Alcatraz."

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These are not the acts of a confident regime. They are frightened of any organized institution that resists their despotic rule. If Iran had a free economy with competitive wages, people would have no need to organize into unions. The rulers by acting as if they are the "voice of God" who may not be broached have increased resistance to their regime that will only grow.