IWSN solidarity activities in Germany

Supporters of the Iranian Workers' Solidarity Network and Der Funke in Germany held a successful public meeting last weekend on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the 1979 Iranian revolution, highlighting the historical background and the objective factors that lead to the overthrow of the Reza Pahlewi dictatorship.

Supporters of the Iranian Workers' Solidarity Network and Der Funke in Germany held a successful public meeting last weekend on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the 1979 Iranian revolution. A leadoff highlighted the historical background and objective factors that lead to the overthrow of the Reza Pahlewi dictatorship in 1979 and also explained why and how in the absence of a clear Marxist leadership and alternative this workers' revolution was finally derailed and captured by the reactionary forces and the mullahs.

A section of the audience at the Wiesbaden solidarity meeting last Friday
A section of the audience at the Wiesbaden solidarity meeting last Friday

The discussion dealt with the support that the old Pahlewi dictatorship had enjoyed from the West and the good relations the Teheran regime had with the then Stalinist leaders in the Kremlin whose main aim was stability, "peaceful coexistence" and the prevention of "uncontrollable" revolutionary eruptions. Activists present in the meeting also underlined the collaboration between the West German state and Pahlewi and the assassination of a West Berlin student by police whose only crime was protesting against the Shah's visit to the city in June, 1967.

Other speakers also emphasised the role of youth in the new revolutionary epoch in Iran since a vast majority of Iranians now do not have any personal memories of the defeats of the past and a younger generation of workers and students is now beginning to stand up against the regime. Fundamentalism is more discredited that in the past and the world crisis of capitalism will also affect Iran. Whereas Western governments and media demagogically deplore the character and phraseology of the Iranian regime and ex-chancellor Schröder has recently paid a visit to Iran to open doors for German big business, our allies in Iran are the left-wing workers and youth fighting for an overthrow of the regime. We will step up the solidarity work in Germany and take the protest to the streets in the coming weeks.

3 March, 2009