(The following article is from the August 1-31, 2007 issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St. Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)
The newly formed Committee for the Defense of Iranian People's Rights (CODIR)-Canada has issued a wide appeal to political parties, unions, women, students, GLBT groups, First Nations, peace organizations and all Canadians concerned with human rights.
The appeal says, "The life of people in today's Iran is probably comparable to what can be imagined as the harshest. The rate of employment is one of the lowest in the contemporary history: widespread poverty, corruption at all levels of government, the social problems such as drug trafficking and substance abuse, prostitution, wide range of child abuse, and oppression against women, gays and lesbians are at record high and still rising. Social security is at its lowest level and phenomena such as robbery and murder has become extremely common. Nepotism and favouritism and abuse of the `power of money', for those who have it, have left people in utter desperation. The clampdown on media and the dissident groups and individuals, violation of freedom of speech and freedom to organize, ethnic and religious discrimination and also discrimination based on gender have turned the living conditions even more intolerable...
"For those familiar with the recent history of Iran existing conditions should not be surprising. This is the natural consequence of 28 years of complete neglect and the most destructive policies of the regime of the `Supreme Religious Leader' (Velayat-e faqih). These policies remain intact only by the imposition of brute force by one of the mob factions within the ruling circle and have singular purpose to retain their hold on power and fill their own pockets with billions of dollars appropriated from the people of Iran.
"The `election' of Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad in the rigged and fraudulent presidential election of 2005 was a significant turning point in the life of Iranian regime. Faced with a vast and popular reformist movement, which had come out against all these hardships to outright challenge the regime's power, the regime decided to use its heavy hand to strike a blow with the intention of wiping out the reform movement.
"Since his `election', Ahmadi-Nejad has missed no opportunity to accomplish this task and has shown extreme persistency in striking against the women, youth and students, intellectuals and the workers. Not a day passes by without activists in various social groups being beaten up, getting disappeared, arrested and convicted for crimes they never committed.
"Unfortunately the international situation is not in favour of the Iranian people either. The threat of war, while Afghanistan and Iraq are already occupied by foreign occupiers, led by the United States, only exacerbates the situation. The people of Iran have no doubt that if a war starts against them, as seen in the case of Iraq and Afghanistan, their lives will worsen further.
"Beside the threat of war, the U.N. sanctions are making the already bad living conditions even worse. The most immediate effect of the sanctions could be seen in the inflation and the rise of prices. In the past few months, people are facing a hyper inflation unprecedented even in the life of the Islamic Republic. The rising prices have put the basic living necessities out of reach for even more people and have created a state of despair and helplessness.
"Under these circumstances and in the spirit of solidarity that we in CODIR-Canada are writing this letter to introduce ourselves and to let our aims be known:
"CODIR-Canada campaigns to raise the Canadian public awareness of peace, human rights and democracy issues in Iran. It strives to provide truthful and unbiased information and analysis about the reality of life in Iran.
"CODIR-Canada advocates for peace and struggles to eliminate the risk of war and tensions in and around Iran, and generally in the Middle East region.
"And CODIR-Canada campaigns to abolish the brutal violation of human rights and all limitations to true democracy in Iran. Among many other rights, it promotes democracy, freedom of speech, freedom of media, freedom to organize, protecting the rights of minorities, and the right of people to elect and be elected at all levels of government.
"In today's globalized world, the effect on nations' lives is also globalized more than ever before in the human history. The collective power of individuals and groups in the humanist traditions can have a significant impact on the lives of other nations. We reach out for your solidarity with the people of Iran."
(Readers are urged to visit the organization's website, http://www.codir.net)