[R-G] U.S. Labor Against the War

[Richard Menec]

http://www.uslaboragainstwar.org/article.php?=1&cache=0&id=14248

U.S. Labor Against the War

August 4, 2007

Below is a letter from John Sweeney, President of the AFL-CIO, to Iraqi 
Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki, expressing his strong condemnation of an 
order issued by the Iraqi Oil Minister to state-owned oil companies not to 
recognize or deal with the Iraqi Federation of Oil Unions, a federation that 
represents 26,000 of the
36,000 oil sector workers in Iraq. The Oil Minister has played foil for the 
U.S. in this brazen effort to suppress popular resistance to the Oil (theft) 
Law.

The IFOU has been at the forefront of the struggle to preserve public 
ownership and control of Iraq's oil resources in the face of a concerted 
effort by the U.S. government, the International Monetary Fund and 
multinational oil corporations to impose a new "Hydrocarbon Law" on Iraq 
that would privatize control of 2/3 or more of Iraq's oil, the second 
largest reserves of oil in the world.  The IFOU has, with support of four 
other labor federations in Iraq, declared it will resist this raid on the 
national heritage of Iraqis, including by work stoppages and strikes if 
necessary.

It was Paul Bremer, President Bush's "Viceroy", who claimed Saddam Hussein's 
1987 law banning unions in public enterprises as his own and passed that law 
on to the hand-picked Interim Governing Council he created to provide an 
Iraqi fig leaf for the U.S. occupation. Rather than scrap that law, the 
Maliki government has elected to continue enforcing it.  This has led to 
raids on union offices, seizure of union records, destruction of union 
office equipment, freezing union bank accounts, arrest, beating and 
kidnapping of union activists, and even assassination of union leaders. The 
fact that the Oil Minister felt free to hide behind a dictator's anti-labor 
law says much about whether it is the roots of democracy being planted in 
Iraq or the roots of authoritarian neo-colonial U.S. control.

US Labor Against the War urges its affiliates, all labor organizations, and 
individual workers to let the government of Iraq know that the world is 
watching and will not allow them to continue violating labor rights of Iraqi 
union members with impunity.  But we must also tell the U.S. Congress that 
its support for a "benchmark" calling for adoption of the Oil (theft) Law 
makes it an accomplice in this crime.  We should demand that the Congress 
drop this benchmark and renounce any effort to impose a new regime of 
private foreign control of Iraqi oil.  The only benchmark that matters now 
is the one that immediately removes all U.S. military forces and mercenary 
contractors from Iraq so that the Iraqi people can determine for themselves, 
free of foreign interference and coercion by occupation, how to rebuild 
their nation and restructure their government and economy.  Congress has a 
duty to use its control over appropriations to immediately defund all 
military operations in Iraq, except for the rapid evacuation of US forces, 
contractors and any Iraqis who by virtue of their service to the U.S. 
require refuge outside of Iraq.  Only when the 70% of the American people 
who want an end to the occupation ACT to demand an end to the war, will a 
spineless Congress develop the backbone required to end it.

http://uslaboragainstwar.org/downloads/Sweeney%20letter%2008.03.07.pdf

American, Federation of Labor a Congress of Industrial Organizations

____

August 2. 2007

His Excellency Nouri Al Maliki, Prime Minister

The Republic of Iraq

Baghdad, Iraq

Dear Mr. Prime Minister

On behalf of the nearly ten million working men and women of the American 
Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL CIO), I 
write to strongly condemn an order given by the Minister of Oil an July 18 
prohibiting it, agencies and departments from dealing with the country's oil 
unions, declaring them and all unions in the public sector "illegal."

Shockingly, this directive relies an labor and trade union laws developed by 
the previous dictatorial regime of Saddam Hussein in the 1980s, intended to 
squash democracy in the workplace, ban independent trade unions and silence 
workers.  This attempt to silence Iraqi unions is an unacceptable attack an 
human rights in Iraq and a breach of the most fundamental rights to freedom 
of association, which Iraq is required to uphold by virtue of its membership 
in the International Labor Organization (ILO).

Your government's actions in this case appear to undermine a previous 
commitment to develop a new labor law in consultation with the ILO.  This 
process began in 2004 and is currently on hold.  Iraqi workers deserve a new 
labor law that would afford them, for the first time in decades, the rights 
enshrined in the ILO's Declaration on the Fundamental Principles and Rights 
at Work.

Iraqi Workers have been joining together freely to form trade unions across 
the country, including in the oil sector, since 2003.  The AFL CIO has 
worked closely with Iraqi labor representatives and their supporters 
worldwide to rebuild labor institutions and to promote trade unions and 
worker rights in Iraq. Trade unions are a fundamental civil society 
organization necessary for democracies to grow and thrive.  We urge the 
Iraqi government to withdraw this order immediately. Further, we urge the 
Iraqi government to revive its consultations with the ILO in order to 
replace the labor laws installed by a dictator, with a truly democratic 
labor law worthy of a new democratic Iraq.

________

Direct your messages to:

U.S. Embassy of the Republic of Iraq 1801 P Street, NW Washington, DC 20036 
Tel: (202) 483-7500

New general e-mail address is admin at iraqiembassy.org.

Ambassador's Office Fax: (202) 462-5066

A copy to USLAW at info at uslaboragainstwar.org will enable us to pass your 
messages on to the Iraqi Oil Workers Union.

Messages to your member of Congress and Senators can be sent at 
http://www.house.gov/writerep/ for the House and 
http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

USLAW updates its website daily with news, analysis, commentary, fact sheets 
and other resources about the oil law, the Iraqi labor movement, the 
political and military situation in Iraq and the region, and resistance to 
the occupation by Iraqis and people around the world.

U.S. Labor Against the War (USLAW)

Email: <info at uslaboragainstwar.org>

PMB 153

1718 "M" Street, NW

Washington, D.C. 20036

Voicemail: 202/521-5265

Co-convenors:  Kathy Black, Gene Bruskin, Maria Guillen, Fred Mason,

Bob Muehlenkamp, and Nancy Wohlforth

Michael Eisenscher, National Coordinator & Webmaster

Adrienne Nicosia, Administrative Staff

Tom Gogan, Organizer

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