Iraqi trade unions

According to Iraq Oil Report (4 August), the Ministry of Industry and Minerals has written a memo “advising” its employees to avoid unions. The move highlights how the consolidation of the Maliki government in Iraq, and of something approaching real government administration in the country, cuts two ways. The government is more assertive with the USA. It organised celebrations when US troops quit Iraq’s cities on 30 June. There was some fudging at the edges of that withdrawal, but the US troops have largely stayed out of the cities since, and are due to withdraw completely by December 2011...

From the Justice for Iranian workers website, mobilising for the world day of solidarity with Iranian workers on June 26th (at http://www.justiceforiranianworkers.org/?p=758 ): Message from the port workers’ union in Iraq "After receiving your Circular, we have immediately contacted all trade union officials for an urgent meeting and decided to gather on 26 June at the headquarter of the union and demonstrate to denounce the acts of the Iranian government against trade unionists and workers. We will update you with the planned activities as soon as possible." That Iraqi unions, themselves long...

Over 500 members of the Iraqi Teachers' Union demonstrated in Baghdad on Friday 28 March against an attempt by the Iraqi government to take over the union. Apparently basing itself on "Decision no.3" made by the "Governing Council" appointed by the US as the nominal authority in Iraq between July 2003 and June 2004, the Government has threatened to remove the existing (elected) leadership of the Teachers' Union and impose new elections. Please use the Labourstart website to send messages supporting the Iraqi Teachers' Union. "Decision no.3", as far as I know, was a purported "de-Ba'thifying"...

Ruth Cashman reports on the first international labour conference ever held in Iraq, which she attended in Erbil on 13-14 March. The conference, included hundreds of delegates from oil and gas, ports, electricity, construction, public sector, transport, communications, education, rail, health care, metal working, journalists, food workers and students. Delegations from the US, the UK, South Africa, Japan, Australia, and Iran were also there. At this conference three powerful unions, the Federation of Oil Unions in Iraq , the Electricity Association and the General Federation of Workers...

Ben Lando of United Press International and Iraq Oil Report has written this report on the upcoming international labour conference called by Iraqi trade unionists and to be held in Erbil, Iraq, on 13-14 March. "In mid-March, a historic meeting of Iraqi workers is scheduled in Erbil, Iraq. Banned by Saddam Hussein, trade unions representing workers in the oil, electricity, construction, port and teaching trades have organized to demand back and increased pay, fight privatization and foreign workers, and defend other workers’ rights. The most vocal and organized of the newly formed unions are...

The attached broadsheet gives information on the March 2009 international labour conference, called by Iraqi trade unionists to take place in Iraq, and recent workers' struggles in Iraq. Download as pdf (see "attachment").

The “First International Labour Conference in Iraq”, called by a range of Iraqi trade-union organisations for February 2009 in Erbil (in Kurdish northern Iraq), has won support from Australian and US union organisations. The Teachers’ Federation, the Fire Brigades Union, and the Construction, Forestry, Mining, and Energy Union in New South Wales have all agreed to donate to the cost of the conference and to consider the possibility of sending delegates. Australia-Asia Worker Links, an influential and active union-sponsored body based in Melbourne, has also agreed to back the conference...

Kathy Black spoke for US Labor Against War (USLAW) at a meeting at Melbourne Trade on 12 March. Riki Lane summarises her speech. USLAW is a rank and file initiative, not an official wing of the AFL-CIO. Its achievements are quite historic. It now has almost 200 affiliates, representing three million workers. They have managed to avoid the “hardhats versus hippies” syndrome of the anti-Vietnam war movement, and to turn out a contingent of 4,000 unionists to a major anti war demonstration. They have affiliates in both the AFL-CIO and the split off “Change to Win” federation; they have managed...

By Martin Thomas Two of Iraq’s major union federations have formed a united front to fight against oil privatisation and the government’s attempt to outlaw the oil unions. On 8 September the Iraqi Federation of Oil Unions and the Federation of Workers’ Councils and Unions held a launch conference in Basra (centre of the southern Iraqi oil industry) for their united front. They plan to organise a joint demonstration on 24 September. IFOU president Hassan Jumaa said that his union will shut down the oil pipelines if the parliament passes the privatisation law. Iraq’s other main union...

AusIraq , in Australia, has put out a petition supporting the Iraqi oil unions now under attack from the Iraqi government. Download an adapted version here ; please circulate it and seek signatures. To the Government of Iraq We, the undersigned protest that: The Iraqi government has maintained and used Saddam's infamous Decree 150 of 1987 that banned all trade union activity by deeming workers in the state sectors to be 'civil servants' without the right to organise. In August 2005 the Iraqi government issued Decree 8750, authorising itself to confiscate all trade-union funds Recently the US...