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15 January, 2007
After 22 days in an Iranian jail, Sherkat-e Vahed trade union leader Mansour Osanloo of the Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company was released for a second time on 19 December after his wife deposited a sizeable bail bond.
Sherkat-e Vahed trade union leader Mansour Osanloo
The release was welcomed by the Iranian union’s global federation, the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF), but the ITF expressed disgust that Iran is now resorting to added bail money and other restrictions to hold back legitimate trade union rights.
Osanloo was arrested outside his home on 19 November by plain-clothes policemen, who beat him and forced him at gunpoint into a car. He appeared in court a week later, but no charges were filed against him. In August 2006, only three months earlier, he was released from prison, after nearly eight months of detention for essentially championing union rights among Tehran’s bus drivers.
In January 2006, a strike by drivers was met with brutal clubbings and beatings by Iranian police forces. Many among some 50 strike leaders have been terminated and/or blacklisted for their suspected involvement in that strike. The ITF, in coordination with the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), has been engaged in a campaign against Iran’s rights’ abuses, using both direct protests and formal complaints.
Following Osanloo’s 19 December release, ITF Gen. Sec. David Cockroft stated, “The persecution of this man has got to stop. Fundamental trade union rights have to be respected in Iran, and we await similar news concerning Mansour Osanloo’s trade union colleagues, some of whom have been sacked and all of whom have been denied the right to be represented by the union of their choice.”