Iran: Mahmood Salehi, leading labour activist arrested

From: Laborurnet.net:

Report by WPI England

Mahmood Salehi, a leading labour activist from the city of Saghez, was re-arrested on Monday April 9 by the Islamic regime’s security forces. Salehi who was at work at the time was taken during his lunch break by armed security forces to the public prosecutor’s office regarding his bail on charges of organizing May Day strikes and demonstrations last year.Later at the public prosecutor’s office, a revised court verdict was read to him summarily sentencing him to one year imprisonment and 3 years suspended sentence.

He was immediately transferred to the city of Sanandaj prison.Clearly this is an attempt to intimidate and attack the labour movement both in Iran and internationally. Last Year Manhood Salehi was bailed under immense international pressure from trade unions, and labour and progressive organizations internationally.

In addition, this is an attempt to undermine the vibrant workers’ movement Iran which is preparing to organize for this year’s international May Day celebrations following a huge teachers’ strike in Iran in the last couple of months over pay and conditions which resulted in the arrest of 45 teachers’ activists in the city of Hamedan on Saturday 7th April 2007.With nation-wide and daily protests such as the teachers’ strikes challenging the Islamic Republic of Iran, the regime is fearful of a powerful confrontation on May Day and is attempting to undermine the momentum of this movement by threats, intimidations and arrests of activists and labour leaders.

Note to the Editors:
Mahmood Salehi has been arrested twice since May 2003 for organizing May Day during recent last years. He was freed as a result of huge international campaigns for his release on both occasions. Mahmood Salehi has been recalled to the court over and over and has been under permanent threat and pressure by the Islamic Republic of Iran since his first arrest in May Day of 2003.

In a Related News: Iran: More Arrests of Teachers!

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Iranian Blogger Kianoosh Sanjari if Freed--Describes Torture

Activist Kianoosh Sanjari in his first interview since his release describes his horrific torture at Iran's notorious Evin Prison.

The Belfast Telegraph and Iranian Press News reported today that Iranian activist and blogger Kianoosh Sanjari has been released from Evin Prison. Sanjari, who was first arrested by the regime when he was 17, was re-arrested in October when he went to the home of secular Ayatollah Mohammed Kazemaini Borojerdi. The senior Shi'ite Muslim cleric who had challenged Iran's system of clerical rule and the regime was also arrested by the regime.
Via IPN:

When a bruised Kianoosh Sanjari climbed from the police van last October, he immediately recognised the familiar drab buildings of Evin prison section 240, run by the plainclothes branch of the Revolutionary Guards. His crime? Reporting for his weblog on the violent arrest of a religious group by security forces.

In his first interview since being released Iran's most prominent blogger recalls the rough tactics used against him by the authorities and the backlash against US support for democracy activists in the Islamic Republic.

In early October, Mr Sanjari went to the home in western Tehran of the dissident cleric Ayatollah Mohammed Kazemaini Borojerdi and watched as security forces attacked his followers outside.

"The alley was flooded with broken glass, water, teargas and riot police with batons hitting everybody," he said. "A police van was being used as a battering ram. Our eyes were burning and our faces hurt. I crawled into a camper van where another woman was hiding. I heard people being beaten and knew that in a few seconds, I'd be beaten too. The broken windows cut my side as I was pulled out. I was knocked unconscious."

He spent the next three months in Evin, where he had been interned several times before. He was blindfolded and questioned and slapped by the interrogator, whose questions took a new and sinister turn.

h/t to gatewaypundit

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