HomeNEWSIRAN NEWSProtests continue in Iran as Diaspora rallies against appeasement policy
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Protests continue in Iran as Diaspora rallies against appeasement policy

By Mahmoud Hakamian
Railway workers on strike in northwest Iran demanding their rights, especially their delayed paychecks and pensions - May 27, 2023
Railway workers on strike in northwest Iran demanding their rights, especially their delayed paychecks and pensions - May 27, 2023

Activists in various cities of Iran reported different protests as people are finding it all the more difficult to make ends meet. Workers of different industries in several cities were protesting for their delayed paychecks and pensions on Saturday, as their families can barely put food on the table with rising inflation and skyrocketing prices.

In cities checkered Europe freedom-loving Iranians and supporters of the Iranian opposition MEK have been rallying and protesting the appeasement policy vis-à-vis Tehran, as seen recently in the prisoner swap between Belgium and the Iranian regime that led to the release of the mullahs’ convicted diplomat-terrorist Assadollah Assadi on Friday.

People throughout Iran continue to specifically hold the mullahs’ Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei responsible for their miseries, while also condemning the oppressive the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and paramilitary Basij units, alongside other security units that are on the ground suppressing the peaceful demonstrators.

Protests in Iran have to this day expanded to at least 282 cities. Over 750 people have been killed and more than 30,000 are arrested by the regime’s forces, according to sources of Iranian opposition People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK). The names of 675 killed protesters have been published by the PMOI/MEK.

Brave youths in Kerman, south-central Iran, attacked an IRGC base on Friday night. Activists say this attack was in response to the recent death of 16-year-old Abolfazl Amir-Attaie who was shot in Shahr-e Rey, south of Tehran, during the Iranian revolution protests and was in a coma for eight months. He regained consciousness on May 22 only to succumb to his wounds just five days later. His mother posted the sad news of his passing on Friday night local time.

Locals in the Shahrak-e Bagheri district of the Iranian capital Tehran began chanting anti-regime slogans on Sunday night, including “Down with Khamenei!” specifically targeting regime dictator Ali Khamenei.

Disabled individuals are rallying outside the regime’s Majlis (parliament) on Sunday demanding answers about the government’s budget regarding the country’s disabled individuals and they’re seeking adequate living conditions. The protesters are saying the regime has long cancelled necessary budgets that would provide for their basic needs.

In other news on Sunday, human rights activists are reporting that an individual by the name of Abdolrahman Mozafari was executed early Sunday morning in Sanandaj Central Prison in Kurdistan Province, western Iran. He had been held behind bars for 17 years.

Retired steel workers also gathered on Sunday to protest poor living conditions and regime officials’ refusal to address their demands. This rally was held in the western districts of Alborz Province, located west of the country’s capital Tehran.

Retirees and pensioners of the regime’s Social Security Organization in the cities of Ahvaz, Shushtar and Shush in Khuzestan Province, southwest Iran; Isfahan in central Iran, and Kermanshah in western Iran, are holding a gathering on Sunday demanding their rights while protesting their low pensions.

Pensioners and retirees are among the worst-hit segments of Iran’s society. They depend on government stipends to make ends meet, but the regime has refused to increase their pensions in correspondence with growing inflation and the depreciation of the national currency.

The government has long provided many hollow promises of increasing pensions. It was also supposed to settle unpaid pensions remaining from previous years. So far, it has yet to deliver on both demands.

Interestingly, the regime’s own media reported that The Social Security Investment Company (SHASTA), the financial institution that is supposed to fund retirees, has seen a significant increase in its profits in the past years. However, these profits have yet to materialize in the lives of pensioners and retirees.

Workers of the Kaleybar Nephelin Syenite Complex in northwest Iran held a gathering today protesting not having official employment contracts, and not receiving their paychecks and pensions.

In Hamadan, western Iran, local workers held a gathering outside the governor’s office  on Sunday protesting and demanding their rights.

Locals in Quds City of Tehran Province are holding a gathering on Sunday protesting unjust and cruel measures by regime officials who are confiscating their property.

Personnel of the “Baharan Bartar Torang” company in Mashhad, northeast Iran, were holding a gathering today protesting the lay-off of more than 150 of their colleagues.

Locals in the capital’s Shahrak-e Bagheri district began chanting anti-regime slogans on Saturday night, including: “Down with Khamenei!” referring to regime dictator Ali Khamenei.

Workers of the Makush Steel Company in Bandar Abbas, the provincial capital of Hormozgan in southern Iran, were rallying outside provincial governor’s office on Saturday demanding their rights, including delayed paychecks and pensions.

In other news, railway workers in northwest Iran were on strike on Saturday demanding their rights, especially their delayed paychecks and pensions. Activists were also reporting similar strikes in the cities of Kerman, Qom, Takestan, and Miyane.

Following the prisoner swap between Belgium and the Iranian regime that saw the release of Tehran’s convicted terrorist diplomat Assadollah Assadi released from behind bars and returned to Iran, freedom-loving Iranians and supporters of the Iranian opposition MEK have been rallying on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday in many cities across Europe and other parts of the world to condemn this heinous act of appeasement.

These rallies were seen in Brussels outside the Belgian Foreign Ministry and Prime Ministry’s office, London, Paris, Berlin, Munich, Stockholm, Oslo, Rome, The Hague, Bern, Geneva; Halle, Bremen, Heidelberg, Bonn, Bochum, Cologne, Stuttgart, and Hamburg in Germany; Vienna, Aarhus, Vancouver, Ottawa, among other cities as Iranians held gatherings outside Belgium’s embassies and other public areas to condemn this succumbing to the Iranian regime’s demands. These demonstrators reminded Europe and the West that their failed appeasement policy vis-à-vis Tehran will only embolden the mullahs’ regime as the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism into further belligerence, including plotting terrorist attacks and expanding its infamous hostage diplomacy.

The protests in Iran began following the death of Mahsa Amini. Mahsa (Zhina) Amini, a 22-year-old woman from the city of Saqqez in Kurdistan Province, western Iran, who traveled to Tehran with her family, was arrested on Tuesday, September 13, at the entry of Haqqani Highway by the regime’s so-called “Guidance Patrol” and transferred to the “Moral Security” agency.

She was brutally beaten by the morality police and died of her wounds in a Tehran hospital on September 16. The event triggered protests that quickly spread across Iran and rekindled the people’s desire to overthrow the regime.

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