In a year when thousands of Iranian workers have been laboring for months without pay, and thousands more have been laid off of their jobs, when huge swaths of the Iranian working class are clinging to life under the poverty line (1), when child laborers are consigned to selling flowers by the roadside or digging through scrapyards to eke out a living, we at Mission Free Iran call for international solidarity with Iranian working women and men, and their struggle for a better, humane Iran.

This page includes campaign directions, campaign materials, and supporting documents for anyone who wants to urge the International Labour Organization (a United Nations organization) to purge an egregious abuser of workers and workers’ rights from its membership.

1. CAMPAIGN MATERIALS
– January 7, 2010: Mission Free Iran letter to Director-General of the ILO. This letter may be copied in whole or in part and sent to the ILO (ilo@ilo.org).

– May 26, 2010: IRI Out of the ILO! This document provides argument for why the Islamic Republic should be refused attendance at the ILO’s annual meeting and should be expelled from the ILO. It encourages readers to write to the ILO (ilo@ilo.org) to demand the Islamic regime’s expulsion.

– May 28, 2010: We Demand Better for Our Children: End Child Labor in Iran. This document highlights the problem of child labor in Iran, underscores that it is the policies of the Islamic regime that result in such destitution that children are forced to work instead of going to school, and encourages readers to write to the ILO (ilo@ilo.org) to demand the Islamic regime’s expulsion.

2. SUPPORTING DOCUMENTS
– September 3, 2009: Haft Tappeh Iran Request for ILO intervention (pdf file)

– January 16, 2010: Expulsion of Islamic Republic of Iran from the International Labor Organization, International Labour Solidarity Committee of the Worker Communist Party of Iran, translated to English by Mission Free Iran

– May 3, 2010: Photos and event report from the May 1st March at Union Square in New York City, which Mission Free Iran attended to ensure that the demands of Iranian workers were heard internationally.

– June 2, 2010: WPI Ensures Demands of Iranian Workers Are Heard at the Annual Meeting of the ILO (includes important video)

3. FOOTNOTES
(1) According to the latest report from the Statistical Center of Iran, 10 million Iranians are surviving below the absolute poverty line, while 30 million are below the relative poverty line.