A Reply To Owen Tudor on Decree 8750

Dear Friend,

Please treat this as an open letter and feel free to circulate.

The head of the TUC European Union and International Department, Owen Tudor, has written a letter criticising Iraq's oil workers' union, for not building links with certain international union federations, and lambasting solidarity organisations for issuing statements alerting the trade unions and general public to the escalating anti-trade union measures and oil privatisation plans in Iraq. [Copies of Owen Tudor's statement, and the Naftana (Arabic for "our oil") and US Labour Against the War (USLAW) statements are reproduced below this email.]

Instead of directing his fire at the anti-trade union measures in occupied Iraq, Owen Tudor prefers to level a false accusation against a besieged trade union representing impoverished workers, languishing under a ruthless occupation. He also takes a swipe at "small" solidarity organisations in Britain and USA, and engages in diversionary nitpicking and making light of the grave problems facing the Iraqi people and trade unions.

But despite Owen Tudor's attempt to cloud the issues and downplay the seriousness of the problems facing Iraq's genuinely independent trade unionists, the facts are plain and simple to understand. The Iraqi government has, in the past few months, accelerated the implementation of decree 8750. The Iraqi Ministerial Council approved decree 8750 in August 2005 (probably not published in the official gazette till September) promising "a new paper on how trade unions should function, operate and organise," dissolving one government committee and replacing it with a new ministerial committee that includes the minister for National Security, to be in charge of Labour and Social Rights, and stating that the new committee would control all trade union funds. Using wording rivalling the deviousness of the Saddam regime's 1987 anti-trade union law, decree 8750 does not ban trade unions. In 2004 US administrator Paul Bremer issued a notorious directive, still in effect, reviving Saddam's 1987 anti-union decree, which also did not ban trade unions as such, but merely deemed all workers in the state sector to be civil servants. Civil servants were of course banned from joining trade unions.

Similarly, decree 8750 is worded such that it effectively makes all union activity illegal. The decree states that the new ministerial committee "must take control of all monies belonging to the trade unions and prevent them from dispensing any such monies." How trade unions can function legally when it is illegal to dispense a penny on their activities, only Owen Tudor knows. He also knows how to stay calm and not resort to "hyperbole" when "Unions in Iraq are clearly still functioning, and have been since the Decree was announced." In English, this means that his TUC department will not launch a serious campaign to defend Iraq's independent trade unionists until they all stop functioning.

While the country burned and cities were at the receiving end of trigger-happy US Marines, US air and land bombardment, and occupation-induced terrorist attacks, the government proceeded this year with the implementation of the anti-union policies and decrees. As if it was not bad enough that his TUC department did not campaign to defend the Iraqi lawyers' and writers' unions, Owen Tudor tries to downplay nakedly anti-union measures by describing properly constituted unions, with elected officers, as "more professional associations than trade unions."

In April the government accelerated the implementation of its 8750 anti-union decree. Contrary to Tudor Owen's accusations of "hyperbole," the Naftana statement below understates the scale of the problem facing Iraqi trade unions by highlighting the actual freezing of the accounts of only the oil workers' union. The government decree in fact ordered control over the accounts of all trade unions (including those close to the government).

I find it astonishing that he chooses to accuse the oil workers union, whom the TUC officially invited to Britain last year, of not communicating with international union federations. He knows very well that the oil workers' union has been trying very hard to establish such contacts in the face of insidious, but polite and patronising disregard. He also knows that this union is financially strapped -(the price of true independence under occupation)- and relies heavily on its supporters in Britain to communicate its news in English to the British and world trade union movement. Instead of publicly criticising the union, he should be writing to them expressing concern at the news of freezing their account, ascertaining the full facts and offering financial and other help. He should also be asking them how the TUC could help the union's planned second anti-privatisation conference in Basra.

It is deeply regrettable that some in the TUC international department prefer to turn a blind eye to certain international events, which are seriously threatening trade unionists abroad, if such events are deemed to be politically embarrassing to Blair's government. For them Iraq is building a democracy, and strangling independent trade union activity does not fit in with that fictitious Blairite image of Iraq, an image designed to lull trade unionists into silence about the gravity of the situation in Iraq, and thwart calls for the swift withdrawal of the US and British occupation forces.

In the name of supporting a fictitious democratic process, they are in effect helping to crush democratic activity. And by not exposing the consequences of the Blairite (Thatcherite) alliance with the Bush administration, some in the TUC international department are, probably with good intentions, helping prolong the occupation of Iraq and privatisation and theft of Iraqi oil and other wealth by the transnationals. In doing this, they are also damaging the reputation and proud record of most of Britain's unions, strongly opposed to the war and continuing occupation of Iraq. Instead, Tudor Owen should also be alerting Britain's unions to the fact that the Iraq's oil minister is preparing the ground for signing privatisation agreements, deceptively called Production Sharing Agreements, with the transnational oil barons.

The TUC is perhaps not aware that the occupation authorities have spent millions of dollars on so called civil society and other 'sweetheart' organisations to prop up activities designed to draw attention away from the war crimes of the occupation forces and plans to privatise Iraq's oil and main industries. The implementation, probably selectively, of decree 8750 will hit the genuinely independent organisations hardest, because they rely heavily on the pennies they collect from impoverished workers and donations collected by solidarity organisations .

Decree 8750 is aimed at strangling the truly independent trade unions and other mass organisations. International solidarity helps them stay independent and to resist pressures to turn them into 'sweetheart' unions, docile apologists of the occupation and the transnationals.

Best wishes,
Sami Ramadani
26 June 2006

**************************************************
Sami Ramadani,
Department of Applied Social Sciences,
London Metropolitan University, City Campus,
Old Castle Street, London, E1 7NT

Tel: 020 7320 1280
Email: Sami.Ramadani@londonmet.ac.uk
**************************************************

1. Statement by the TUC's Owen Tudor

"The TUC is unaware of what has happened to the Oil Workers Union (it
doesn't help that they seem only to communicate with small campaigning
organisations rather than the global oil workers federation (ICEM) or
the global trade union movement (ICFTU), but it is certainly true that
Decree 8750 has been used to intervene in the lawyers union and others
(note that this organisation and others affected are more professional
associations than trade unions, not that that makes the government's
actions any better).

However, it is a massive exaggeration to describe Decree 8750 as "the
September 2005 decree making all trade union activity illegal", and
things are bad enough without exaggerating and giving completely the
wrong impression. Unions in Iraq are clearly still functioning, and have
been since the Decree was announced (in August by the way).

This is not intended to stop people protesting about Decree 8750, as the
TUC, ICFTU and Iraqi unions have been for nearly a year. But hyperbole
doesn't help, it sends people off in the wrong direction.

Owen Tudor, Head of TUC European Union and International Relations
Department
Congress House, Great Russell Street, London WC1B 3LS
Tel: +44 (0) 20 7467 1325 -- Fax: +44 (0) 20 7436 2830 -- Mobile: +44
(0) 7788 715261 "


2. Naftana Statement (a very similar statement was also issued by US Labor Against the War (USLWA))

OIL UNION BANK ACCOUNT FROZEN
IRAQI GOVERNMENT ATTACKS OPPONENTS OF OIL PRIVATISATION

We have just confirmed reports that the Iraqi regime has frozen all
the bank accounts of the Iraqi oil workers' union, both abroad and
within Iraq.

Wave of anti-union activity by government
The Iraqi regime's decision comes in the wake of a series of anti-union measures,
including the disbanding of the council of the lawyers' union,
freezing the writers' union accounts and the September 2005 decree
making all trade union activity illegal. For that anti-union act the
regime used the pretext of promising the promulgation of a future law
to 'regulate' trade union organisations and their activities.

This action follows in the footsteps of US administrator Paul Bremer
In 2004 Paul Bremer, the occupation's then pro-consul in Iraq,
declared trade union activity in the state sector illegal. That
decision re-enacted Saddam Hussain's 1987 decree banning workers'
unions in the state sector by declaring them to be 'civil servants'
rather than 'workers'.

Hamstringing opponents of oil rip-off
Iraq's enormous oil wealth is being groomed for Production Sharing
Agreements, which would transfer effective control over all aspects
of oil policy, production and marketing to multination oil
companies. The oil workers' union is one of the most effective
opponents of this policy, organising an anti-privatisation conference
last year and another one to come this year.


Notes for journalistss

The GUOE organises over 23,000 oil and gas industry workers Naftana
(Arabic: 'our oil') was set up by UK activists after contact with the
GUOE. We are in regular contact with the leadership of the union.
In August 2003 the union halted oil exports for two days as a protest
over low wages.
The GUOE is independent of any political party or union federation.
GUOE executive committee members, including its President, were part
of the opposition against Saddam Hussein's dictatorship, and many
were imprisoned by the regime. The GUOE is opposed to the military
occupation of Iraq and to the privatisation of the oil and industrial
sectors of Iraq.
The GUOE is a successor to the Southern Oil Company Union (SOCU), set
up immediately after the fall of the Saddam regime.
In October 2003 union activists kicked US company KBR out of oil
industry workplaces.
Sign up to the Naftana email alerts system at
naftana-subscribe@lists.riseup.net


For news of the oil workers union, visit the union's website: http://www.basraoilunion.org/

Sexualised violence against Iraqi women by US forces

A letter to TUC international coordinator Owen Tudor.
Greetings Mr. Tudor.... I just wanted to let you know that my colleagues who are attorneys in San Francisco had helped an intern produce this paper below re sexualized violence against Iraqi women by US occupying forces. My question remains as to what kind of 'action' had been taken up by the UN following this important paper. The issues presented on these papers I believe have Not been satisfactorily addressed . I believe it is time that our perpetrators be made accountable for their crimes, regardless of their nationality, creed or political alliances. It seems that political alliances and nationalities 'save' certain groups from accountability. I believe strongly that this must not continue for the long term health of children and women. Thank you kindly and hope to hear from you soon..... Cheers. B Kawamura, Oslo .


A Briefing Paper of International Educational Development
Prepared by Kristen McNutt, Researcher, Association of Humanitarian Lawyers. Presented to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights 2005 Session, Geneva. Contact: ied@igc.org

Iraqi female detainees have been illegally detained, raped and sexually violated by United States military personnel. Women who stay at home in traditional roles are more likely to be imprisoned as bargaining chips by US troops seeking to pressurize male relatives, according to the New Statesmen (UK)[i]. In December 2003, a woman prisoner, "Noor", smuggled out a note stating that US guards at Abu Ghraib had been raping women detainees and forcing them to strip naked. Several of the women were now pregnant.[ii] The classified enquiry launched by the US military, headed by Major General Antonio Taguba, has confirmed the note by "Noor" and that sexual violence against women at Abu Ghraib took place. Among the 1,800 digital photographs taken by US guards inside Abu Ghraib there were, according to Taguba's report, images of naked male and female detainees; a male Military Police guard "having sex" with a female detainee; detainees (of unspecified gender) forcibly arranged in various sexually explicit positions for photographing; and naked female detainees.[iii] The Bush administration has refused to release photographs of Iraqi women prisoners at Abu Ghraib, including those of women forced at gunpoint to bare their breasts (although these have been shown to Congress). [iv] UK Member of Parliament Ann Clwyd (L) has confirmed a report of an Iraqi woman in her 70s who had been harnessed and ridden like a donkey at Abu Ghraib and another coalition detention centre after being arrested last July. Clwyd said: "She was held for about six weeks without charge. During that time she was insulted and told she was a donkey."[v]

The Italian journalist, Giuliana Sgrena, reports that In the middle of the night, American soldiers broke into the home of Mithal al Hassan and arrested both her and her son. "The soldiers later ransacked the apartment. Denounced as part of a vendetta, Mithal was condemned without trial to eighty days of horror in the company of other women prisoners who, like her, were subjected to abuse and torture. She has since spotted her tormentors on the internet." [vi] A culture of honor prevents many women from telling stories of rapes. The account given by "Selwa", illustrates this. In September 2003, Selwa was taken by US military personnel to a detention facility in Tikrit, where an American officer lit a mixture of human feces and urine in a metal container and gave Selwa a heavy club to stir it. She recalls, "The fire from the pot felt very strong on my face." She leans forward and sweeps her hands through the air to show how she stirred the excrement. "I became very tired," she says. "I told the sergeant I couldn't do it." "There was another man close to us. The sergeant came up to me and whispered in my ear, 'If you don't, I will tell one of the soldiers to fuck you.'" Selwa could not continue with the story.[vii] An Iraqi girl, Raghada, reports that her mother, imprisoned at Abu Ghraib, was forced to eat from a toilet and was urinated on[viii]

Iman Khamas, head of the International Occupation Watch Center, a nongovernmental organization which gathers information on human rights abuses under coalition rule, has said; "one former detainee had recounted the alleged rape of her cell mate in Abu Ghraib." According to Khamas, the prisoner said; "she had been rendered unconscious for 48 hours." She claimed; "She had been raped 17 times in one day by Iraqi police in the presence of American solders".[ix]

Another woman, "Nadia," reported that she was raped by US soldiers at Abu Ghraib prison. She continues to be "imprisoned" by painful memories that left her psychologically and physically scarred. [x]

Late last year, attorney Amal Kadham Swadi, one of seven female lawyers now representing women detainees in Abu Ghraib, began to piece together a picture of systemic abuse and torture by US guards against Iraqi women held in detention without charge. This was not only true of Abu Ghraib, she discovered, but was, as she put it, "happening all across Iraq". Amal Kadham Swadi states that "sexualized violence and abuse committed by US troops goes far beyond a few isolated cases." [xi] It is unknown as to exactly how many female detainees there are. 'The International Committee of the Red Cross reports that 30 women were housed in Abu Ghraib last October, 2003, which was reduced to 0 by May 29, 2004".[xii]

Swadi visited a detainee held at the US military base a Al-Khakh, a former police compound in Baghdad. The detainee disclosed that, "Several American solders had raped her and that she had tried to fight them off and they had hurt her arm".[xiii]

These and other incidents are being covered up for US domestic consumption. President G W Bush has insisted that these were the actions of a few and were not the result of military policy. However, a fifty-three-page report, obtained by The New Yorker, written by Major General Antonio M. Taguba and not meant for public release, points to complicity to sexual torture by the entire Army prison system. Specifically, Taguba found that between October and December of 2003 there were numerous instances of "sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses" at Abu Ghraib.[xiv]

The cover-up by the Bush Administration appears to include the silencing of victims. Professor Huda Shaker al-Nuaimi, a political scientist at Baghdad University, who is interviewing female prisoners as a volunteer for Amnesty International, reports that the woman, called "Noor," who smuggled the letter out of Abu Ghraib, is now presumed dead. "We believe she was raped and that she was pregnant by a US guard. After her release from Abu Ghraib, I went to her house. The neighbors said that her family had moved away. I believed that she was killed".[xv]

It is well known that the US has a culture of rape: one in six women in the United States has experienced an attempted or completed sexual assault.[xvi] Reinforcing the climate of sexual violence, photos purporting to be of raped Iraqi women by US troops are surfacing on the web[xvii], with some are later removed. [xviii] Actual pictures can be viewed, as of this writing, at the La Voz de Aztlan website [xix] which reports that many of the pictures are now on pornographic sites.

Women Civilian War Casualties

In October 2004, the Iraq Body Count (IBC) website counted casualties of the US attack against Fallujah. IBC concluded that 572 and 616 of the approximately 800 reported deaths were of civilians, with over 300 of these being women and children. [xx] The Chinese news agency Xinhua reported that dozens of Iraqis, including 20 medics, were killed when the US bombed a medical clinic in Fallujah. The clinic was just erected to substitute for the main hospital which was seized by the U.S. on Monday. One doctor told Reuters "There is not a single surgeon in Fallujah. We had one ambulance hit by US fire and a doctor wounded. There are scores of injured civilians in their homes whom we can't move. A 13-year-old child just died in my hands."[xxi] Because of the serious assault on medical neutrality, on 18 November 2004 the Association of Humanitarian Lawyers filed an emergency petition at the Organization of American States Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on behalf of "unnamed, unnumbered patients and medical staff, both living and dead, of the Falluja General Hospital and a trauma clinic." International Educational Development, Inc, joined this action immediately thereafter.

According to the Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena, napalm appears to have been used on women and children during the US attack on Fallujah. [xxii]

U.S. Military Prevents the Delivery of Medical Care to Women Civilians

The Fourth Geneva Convention forbids attacks on emergency vehicles and the impediment of medical operations during war. The main hospital in Amiriyat al-Fallujah was raided twice by US soldiers and the Iraqi National Guard; first on November 29, 2004 at 5:40 am and again the next day. Staff reported; "In the first raid about 150 soldiers and at least 40 members of the Iraqi National Guard stormed the small hospital".[xxiii] Staff reported; "They divided into groups and were all over the hospital. They broke the gates outside, they broke the doors of the garage, and the raided our supply room where our food and supplies are".[xxiv] Staff members were then handcuffed and interrogated for several hours about resistance fighters. One staff member recounts; "The Americans threatened that they would do what they did in Fallujah if I didn't cooperate with them".[xxv]

Medical care for civilians was blocked by snipers that are set up along the roads to Fallujah that fire on ambulances. Doctors from the main hospital in Amiriyat al-Fallujah are reporting; "The Americans have snipers all along the road between here and Fallujah. They are shooting our ambulances if they try to go to Fallujah".[xxvi] In addition, medical supplies are being blocked from being sent to hospitals by US troops. In nearby Saqlawiyah, Doctor Abdulla Aziz reported that supplies were being blocked from reaching or leaving Amiriyat al-Fallujah; "They won't let any of our ambulances go to help Fallujah. We are out of supplies and they won't let anyone bring us more".[xxvii]

Obstruction of medical care to the civilian population of Iraq seems to be a pattern that has persisted. Dr. Abdul Jabbar, orthopedic surgeon at Fallujah General Hospital claims that; "The marines have said they didn't close the hospital, but essentially they did. They closed the bridge, which connects us to the city, and closed our roads. They prevented medical care reaching countless patients in desperate need. Who knows how many of them died that we could have saved?".[xxviii]

In addition to blocking supplies and aid to victims, hospital staff has been handcuffed and interrogated and patient care has been violently disrupted. "We were tied up and beaten despite being unarmed and having only our medical instruments," reported Dr Asma Khamis al-Muhannadi present during the raid on Fallujah General Hospital. She reported abuse to civilian patients as well; "troops dragged patients from their beds and pushed them against the wallŠI was with a woman in labor, the umbilical cord had not yet been cut," she said. "At that time, a U.S. soldier shouted at one of the [Iraqi] National Guards to arrest me and tie my hands while I was helping the mother to deliver".[xxix]

[i] Hilsum, Lindsey, "Worldview" New Statesman, October 4, 2004, http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0FQP/is_4708_133/ai_n6258533
[ii] Hassan, Ghali, "Colonial Violence against Women in Iraq" 31 May, 2004
Countercurrents.org , online, Internet, http://www.countercurrents.org/iraq-hassan310504.htm. Also see, Bazzi, Mohammed, U.S. using some Iraqis as bargaining chips, Newsweek, 26 May 2004.
[iii] "Executive summary of Article 15-6 investigation of the 800th
Military Police Brigade by Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba"
NBC News, March 4, 2004, online, Internet, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4894001/
[iv] Luke Harding, "The Other Prisoners," The Guardian U.K. 20 May 2004, online, Internet: www.truthout.org/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi/9/4566/printer.
[v] Ibid.
[vi] Sgrena, Giulana, "Interview with an Iraqi woman tortured at Abu Grhaib", Il Manifesto, July 21, 2004, online, Internet, http://www.ilmanifesto.it/pag/sgrena/en/420dc5a37ba4d.html
[vii] McKelvey, Tara, "Unusual Suspects, What happened to the women held at Abu Ghraib? The government isn't talking. But some of the women are" . American Prospect Online, February 1, 2005, http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewPrint&articleId=9044
[viii] Ciezadlo, Annia, "For Iraqi women, Abu Grhaib's taint", Christian Science Monitor, May 24, 2004, http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0528/p01s02-woiq.html
[ix] Gail Hassan, "Colonial violence Against Women in Iraq," Counter Currents.org 31 May 2004, online, Internet: www.countercurents.org/iraq-hassan310504.htm.
[x] " Iraqi Woman Recalls Abu Graib rape ordeal", July 21 (no year), Islam Online, online, Internet: http://islamonline.net/English/News/2004-07/21/article06.shtml
[xi] Luke Harding, "The Other Prisoners," The Guardian U.K. 20 May 2004, online, Internet: www.truthout.org/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi/9/4566/printer.
[xii] Luke Harding, "The Other Prisoners," The Guardian U.K. 20 May 2004, online, Internet: www.truthout.org/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi/9/4566/printer
[xiv] Hersh, Seymour, The New Yorker, 2004, http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?040510fa_fact
[xv] Gail Hassan, "Colonial violence Against Women in Iraq," Counter Currents.org 31 May 2004, online, Internet: www.countercurents.org/iraq-hassan310504.htm.
[xvi] US Center for Disease Control and Prevention, quoted in "V-Day Statistics",Women's Center, Duke University, March 16, 2005, http://wc.studentaffairs.duke.edu/vdaystats.html
[xvii] "Photos on the net - Iraqi woman raped" Islamic Online, May 3 (no year), online, Internet, http://www.islamonline.net/English/News/2004-05/03/article03.shtml
[xviii] "The rape of Iraqi women and girls by US soldiers", Black Oklahoma Today, March 16, 2005, online, Internet, http://www.blackoklahoma.com/html/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=335"
[xix] See http://www.aztlan.net/iraqi_women_raped.htm and http://www.aztlan.net/nineyearoldrapevictim.htm .
[xx] IBC Press Release, 26 October 2004, http://www.iraqbodycount.net/press/index.php#pr9
[xxi] Democracy Now, Headlines for November 10, 2004, : http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/11/10/1536241
[xxii] Sgrena, Guiliana, "Napalm Raid on Falluja, 73 charred bodies - women and children - were found" 23 November 2004, http://www.ilmanifesto.it/pag/sgrena/en/420dd721e0ff0.html
[xxiii] Dahr Jamail, "US Military Obstructing Medical Care in Iraq," Antiwar.Com 14 December 2004, www.antiwar.com/jamail/?articleid=4158.
[xxiv] Ibid.
[xxv] Ibid.
[xxvi] Ibid.
[xxvii] Ibid.
[xxviii] Ibid.
[xxix] Ibid.

Iraqi Government Freezes Oil Workers Union Bank Accounts: USLAW calls for solidarity actions by U.S. labor movement.

The Iraqi regime has frozen all the bank accounts of the Iraqi oil workers' union, both abroad and within Iraq.

The decision comes in the wake of a series of anti-union measures, including the disbanding of the council of the lawyers' union, freezing the writers' union accounts and the September, 2005 decree making all trade union activity illegal. For that anti-union act the regime used the pretext of promising the promulgation of a future law to 'regulate' trade union organizations and their activities.

This action follows in the footsteps of US administrator Paul Bremer. In 2004 the occupation's then pro-consul in Iraq declared trade union activity in the state (public) sector illegal by continuing to enforce Saddam Hussein's 1987 decree banning workers' unions in the state sector by declaring public employees to be 'civil servants' rather than 'workers'.

From Day One of the occupation, the U.S. has aimed to put Iraq's vast oil resources in the hands of multinational energy corporations, if not through direct privatization (the preferred route) then through Production Sharing Agreements. The oil workers' union is one of the most effective opponents of this policy, organizing an anti-privatization conference last year and another one to come this year. In October, 2003, union activists forced KBR out of oil industry workplaces. KBR had been given a no-bid contract to get the oil industry back into production after the invasion.

The General Union of Oil Employees represents 23,000 oil industry workers in Iraq. It is independent of any political party or sectarian group. It is an affiliate of the Iraq Freedom Congress. Its President Hassan Juma'a was among the Iraqi labor leaders who toured the U.S. last June at the invitation of U.S. Labor Against the War.

Here's what you can do now:

USLAW asks unions, labor councils, state federations and labor and other social justice activists across the U.S. to protest the Iraqi regime's interference with and harassment of the GUOE and other unions that are fighting to defend the rights of Iraqi workers in their workplaces and the interests of Iraq's working people in society. Demand that the GUOE bank accounts be unfrozen, that Saddam Hussein's Law 150 be repealed and that labor rights be immediately recognized and fully respected in Iraq in accordance with internationally accepted ILO standards.

Send your protests to:

Jalal Talabani, President

Nouri al-Maliki, Prime Minister

Mahmoud Al-Mashhadani, Parliament Speaker

Jawad Bulani, Minister of the Interior

c/o Embassy of the Republic of Iraq

1801 P St. NW

Washington, D.C. 20036 or

Fax: (202) 462-5066 or admin@iraqiembassy.org

With copies to:

Dr. Condoleezza Rice, Secretary

U.S. State Department

2201 C Street NW Washington, DC 20520

Fax: 202-647-5733

Kindly provide USLAW with a copy which we will pass on to the GUOE in Iraq.

U.S. LABOR AGAINST THE WAR. 1718 M Street, NW, PMB 153, Washington, DC 20036. www.uslaboragainstwar.org; info@uslaboragainstwar.org.

Iraq: The deadliest media war in history

A global campaign has been launched to end the terrifying ordeal of journalists in Iraq, where at least 129 media staff have been killed and hundreds more injured or disabled in what has become the deadliest media war in modern history. On 15 June – Iraq’s National Day of the Press – there will be demonstrations in Iraq and around the region to highlight what the International Federation of Journalists says is the “unspeakable suffering” of media in a country where press freedom is close to extinction because of ruthless extremists and targeting of journalists by warring factions.

Conference of Coalition to Stop Deportations to Iraq

NO DEPORTATIONS TO IRAQ!

Do not deport us back to such an unsafe country as Iraq
End detention, deportation, vouchers and dispersal

Sat 24 June 2006
Venue: The Peel Centre, Percy Circus,
London WC1X 9EY
Nearest station: King’s Cross (Tube and Rail)


10.30 am Registration
11.00 First Session
John McDonnell MP: opening remarks, including invitation to conference to discuss possible national demonstration against deportations.
Dashty Jamal: (International Federation of Iraqi Refugees) – situation in Iraq, why people should not be deported to Iraq
Sawsan Salim: (Kurdistan Refugee Women’s Organisation) Kurdish women and deportation
Speaker from Institute of Race Relations – understanding the situation in Britain and Europe, how to campaign for solidarity and against racism to asylum seekers
Sara Cutler (BID)
Discussion and questions, speakers reply
12.45 Lunch and networking opportunity
2.00 Workshops
2.00 – 3.00 pm
1. Where we come from, how we campaign, communities of resistance: asylum seekers’ own histories, - Iraq, plus Burhan Fatah from Federation of Iraqi Refugees Manchester, Sherzad (Brides without Borders), Emma Ginn (National Coalition of Anti-Deportation Campaigns, Doug Holton (Stop Deporting of Children)
2. Film showing: the campaign’s activities
3.00 – 3.30 pm
3. How asylum seekers can best approach their MP for help
3.30 - 4.00 pm Nominations and elections to Steering Committee
4 – 4.30 pm Afternoon Plenary
George Binette: how campaign can move forward
Jean Lambert MEP: solidarity from a Green perspective, links across Europe
Jeremy Corbyn MP(invited)
5.00 pm conference closes

Other speakers for workshops to be confirmed

For more information please contact Sarah Parker on 0208 809 0633, email sarahp107@hotmail.com or Dashty Jamal (International Federation of Iraqi Refugees) on 07734-704742, email d.jamal@ntlworld.com. Federation of Iraqi Refugees – Manchester, Burhan Fatah: 07866-757213, office number: 0161 2342784, email: burhanfatah@aol.com . Nottingham: Jasm Ghafor, 07739 – 338178, email: jasm rg@yahoo.co.uk

Iraq solidarity conference

Iraq Union Solidarity has joined together with Solidarité Irak (France), the Worker-communist Party of Iraq, and the Alliance for Workers' Liberty, to sponsor a conference to discuss and coordinate international activity in solidarity with the workers' and women's movements in Iraq. Please consider sending a delegate from your organisation. Details below and attached.

Iraq Union Solidarity
c/o David Broder (convenor), 4 Freelands Drive, Fleet, GU52 0TE.
Email: iraqunionsolidarity@yahoo.com.
Web www.iraqunionsolidarity.org.
Phone: (+44) 7798 754 927.
8 June 2006
Dear Friend,

Solidarity with the Iraqi workers’ and women’s movements
Conference 1 July 2006, London

Please come to the conference on "Solidarity with the Iraqi workers’ movement" on Saturday 1 July, 13:00 to 18:00 at the Resource Centre, 356 Holloway Road, London N7.

The purpose of this conference is to bring together groups from across Europe which are campaigning in support of the workers’ and women's movements in Iraq, fighting for an egalitarian and secular politics against both the US/UK occupation and the sectarian militias. It is open to all groups which share these basic priorities.

We can exchange information about our campaigning activities; discuss developments in Iraq and establish points of agreement and common understanding; and discuss possible international initiatives and campaigns.

The provisional agenda is:
1. Reports on the situation in Iraq, by activists recently returned from Iraq.
2. Reports on activity from campaigns represented at the meeting, including IUS and Solidarité Irak.
3. Presentation of and discussion on the Iraq Freedom Congress initiative.
4. Discussion on follow-up activities, including the possibility of a further, larger conference at a later date.
5. Exchange of views on the situation in Iran and activities in solidarity with the workers’ and women’s movements in Iran, against both the US war threat and the Islamic regime.

You may be interested to know that immediately following the conference and also in the Resource Centre, at 18:30, the well-known American writer Greg Palast will be speaking on his new book "Mad House", about big business and the Iraq war, as part of the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty summer school going on in the Resource Centre that same weekend, 1-2 July.

Best wishes,

David Broder, for Iraq Union Solidarity
Nicolas Dessaux, for Solidarité Irak
Houzan Mahmoud, for the Abroad Organisation of Worker-communist Party of Iraq
Martin Thomas, for the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty

ICFTU 2006 Survey of Trade Union Rights Violations in Iraq

The draft legislation which it was hoped would restore trade union rights had not come into force by the end of 2005. Instead, a proscriptive government decree controlling all union finance was passed. During the year, three trade unionists were murdered, several others were the victims of assassination attempts and many were kidnapped.


TRADE UNION RIGHTS IN LAW
New draft labour code
A new labour code was being drafted with input from the ILO. By the end of 2005, however, it had still not been implemented. The draft Transitional Administrative Law included freedom of association and the right to strike.
Old laws still in force
Until a new Labour Code is adopted, the Saddam-era labour laws are technically still in force. Hence, there are still many obstacles to trade union rights, including the ban on organising and the right to strike in the public sector.
Government moves to control trade union finance
In August 2005, the Council of Ministers passed Decree 875. This handed responsibility for labour and social rights to a new committee comprising government ministers. Decree 875 stipulated that the committee "must take control of all monies belonging to the trade unions and prevent them from dispensing any such monies." This gave the government total control of the existing unions' finances, violating the principles of freedom of association.
Decree 875 also speaks of the government's plans for a new paper on how trade unions should "function, operate and organise". In response to criticisms, the government said its only concern was that Iraqi unions were able to operate free of corruption and control, and were fully transparent and democratic.

TRADE UNION RIGHTS IN PRACTICE
Rebirth of the trade union movement
Less than six months after the collapse of the Saddam regime, 12 national democratic unions had been formed, including the Oil and Gas Workers' Union and the Railway Workers' Union, together with trades' councils in eleven Iraqi cities. Many Iraqi trade unionists returned from exile. Organising took place in workplaces where unions were forbidden under Saddam's laws. Unions even succeeded in notching up some successes in defending their workers' rights, such as negotiating pay increases.
The first woman trade union leader in Iraq's history was elected in August 2004 to lead the Electricity and Energy Workers' Union in Basra.
Official recognition - for one union only
There is only one recognised trade union centre, the Iraqi Federation of Workers' Trade Unions (IFTU). This grew out of the (previously underground) Workers' Democratic Trade Union Movement (WDTUM). By the end of 2004, the IFTU had over 300,000 members.
Full freedom of association not yet restored
While there is only one recognised trade union, several other (non-recognised) national-level trade union organisations have been formed, The Federation of Workers' Councils and Unions in Iraq (FWCUI), for example, claims 300,000 members across Iraq, but has been denied recognition as a representative workers' organisation.
The fact that only one national trade union has been granted official recognition severely limits freedom of association. Employers have reportedly used this to refuse to acknowledge other unions in the workplace unless they join the IFTU. They also refused to recognise unions because they were not registered, although there were no offices where they could do so.
Threats to workers trying to take strike action
Many employers have reportedly used the existence of the old laws to threaten any workers seeking to take strike action in public enterprises.

IRAQ LABOUR MOVEMENT FILM SHOWING - THIS TUESDAY

On Tuesday (6th June) at 19:30 Iraq Union Solidarity
will be holding a public meeting at the Marchmont
Street Community Centre - showing 2 new short films
about the Iraqi trade union movement.

IFC GOES FORWARD

A film about the Iraq Freedom Congress, a democratic
and secular initiative supported by the Federation of
Workers' Councils and Unions in Iraq, as well as the
General Union of Oil Employees. The film includes
extensive footage of workers' struggles going on in
Iraq, as well as of a 2005 strike where Basra's
students protested against murderous attacks carried
out by Islamist militias against fellow students. *23
mins

MEETING FACE TO FACE

In June 2005 six senior Iraqi trade union leaders
toured the United States, hosted by U.S. Labor Against
the War, visiting 25 cities and speaking to several
thousand trade unionists, peace activists, and others.
This documentary describes the workers' movement in
Iraq while expressing the message they want to convey
to the world: opposition to the occupation; oppose the
privatisation of Iraq's resources; and support the
right of all Iraqi workers to organize free and
independent trade unions. *27 mins

The meeting will be held @ Marchmont Street Community
Centre, Marchmont St., WC1 (Nearest tube Russell
Square).

USLAW statement on the IFC

Dear Brother Adil and Sister Mahmoud,

The March 18, 2006 announcement of the formation of the Iraq Freedom Congress should be heralded by the peace and democracy-loving people around the world as an important step in Iraq to a just, stable, democratic and peaceful resolution of the tragic circumstances into which the U.S. and its allies have thrust the Iraqi people. U.S. Labor Against the War welcomes this important development.

IFCs commitment to establishing a free, secular and non-ethnic government in Iraq, one that is independent, democratic, and non-religious is a welcome alternative to the chaos and division that followed in the wake of the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq an aggression that exacerbated, exploited and created religious, ethnic and tribal conflict as an instrument of divide and conquer.

The only solution to this crisis is one that is based upon and rooted in the exercise by all the Iraqi people of their right to sovereignty and self-determination based on principles of respect and tolerance for differences in ethnic identity, religious beliefs, political allegiance, and tribal origin. This is a solution that is first and foremost political, not military.

Only with the end of the occupation will real reconstruction of Iraq be possible. The occupation is now the single greatest obstacle to both peace and democratic self-governance for the Iraqi people, and security for the people of Iraq, the U.S. and the world. As we declared in the Final Declaration signed by leaders of the Federation of Workers Councils and Unions in Iraq, the General Union of Oil Employees, the Iraq Federation of Trade Unions and U.S. Labor Against the War at the conclusion of the historic 25-city U.S. tour by Iraqi labor leaders last June, The occupation is the problem, not the solution. Iraqi sovereignty and independence must be restored. The occupation must end in all its forms, including military bases and economic domination.

The occupation has played a major (though not the only) role in strengthening reactionary elements in Iraq, and creating a situation that may lead to sectarian civil war. The ending of the occupation is a precondition for consistent democracy in Iraq.

The independent labor movement, secular and democratic forces that could create a more positive outcome above all, the unions - must be allowed to survive and develop. We are committed to deepening labor solidarity with Iraqs independent labor movement, its womens and other civil society organizations.

We are committed to our common goal of ending the occupation, withdrawal of all the occupation forces and dismantling of all foreign military bases, including those of the U.S., so that the right of the Iraqi people to make an informed and free decision on the future of their country and its system of governance can be guaranteed.

U.S. Labor Against the War Co-Convenors & Steering Committee