Showing posts with label Iran. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Iran. Show all posts

Saturday 10 December 2022

Terrorists.

          The most dangerous terrorist groups on the planet, the most heavily armed, and the ones that have caused more destruction across the world, that no other terrorist group could hope to match. Of course it is the various states. Iranian state has started executing protesters, Italian state condemns prisoners to total sensory deprivation, Greek state shoots teenagers, Israeli state kills and maims Palestinians on a daily basis. Various state bomb countries into the stone age, killing thousands of innocent people and displacing millions. All this is done with the stamp of legitimacy that the various states bestow on their every action, no matter how brutal, callous or inhumane. Yet we tolerate this most savage of terrorist groups to shape our society, to control our every movement, because we seem to accept its claim to a total monopoly on violence that it backs it up with a loaded judicial system. Accepting such a structure in our society is denying our freedoms, our rights to self determination, denying justice and equality for all. We are complicit in this violence from the state's terrorist actions, as long as we pay lip service to this insanity, to be civilised we have to destroy this terrorist structure and build a society on mutual aid, co-operation, between our communities and workplaces, base our society on justice and equality and seeing to the need of all our people, humanity and sustainability.

The following extract is from Enough is Enough.


Poster and flyer distributed and posted up in Lecce

The State is the slaughterer!

          December 12 marks the anniversary of what is known as the “mother of all massacres”, the one in Piazza Fontana, at the Banca dell’Agricoltura in Milan, in 1969. Planned and carried out by fascists in collusion with State apparatuses, many more followed and over the following decade much blood was shed. These were scientifically planned massacres that attempted to impart an even more authoritarian turn to the young Italian Republic.
         On December 5 in Turin, the courts began deliberating the sentencing of two anarchist comrades – Alfredo and Anna – accused of “political massacre” for having placed two explosive devices outside the carabinieri school near Cuneo in 2006, without causing any fatalities or injuries. They both risk life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. Alfredo is being held under the 41 bis regime since May.
         It seems logically absurd to hold a trial for a massacre without a single death, but not when the defendants are anarchists. The State wants to imprison them for life, not for what they have allegedly committed, but for the ideas they carry in their hearts and the actions that are an expression of those ideas.
Visit ann arky's home at https://spiritofrevolt.info   

Tuesday 11 October 2022

Iran.

 

        Once again SubMedia brings news other news channels don't, news from the horse's mouth untainted by the establishment's bias. The latest System Fail 16 is again news from around the world, and a look at what is happening in Iran. 


 

Visit ann arky's home at https://spiritofrevolt.info  

Thursday 29 September 2022

Iran!

   
 
      We should be firing up support and solidarity with the people of Iran. Perhaps it is time to marry those two slogans, one from Iran, "We are no longer scared" to ours, "We will no longer be poor". The courage of the women of Iran surely inspires the desire to set about changing our society. They face a very brutal authoritarian regime, shackled to the blind dictate of religion. We cannot let their struggle be in vain.

An extract from Enough is Enough.
 
Is it a feminist revolution

Is it a feminist revolution because they’re burning their hijab

Is it a feminist revolution because it was started and is led by women

Is it a feminist revolution if men are taking part

Is it a feminist revolution if nothing changes

What does hair have to do with the revolution

Glory and power to the women in Iran.

            If we’re lucky, women are semi-colons in the stories written by men and other egomaniacs and “revolutionaries” who think we don’t know that they don’t know what they’re doing; who think we don’t know that they just want some more of that power that the State monopolizes and not liberation for us all.
           Glory and power to the women in Iran who have seized the narrative and become object and subject. Women are too often the afterthought of a revolution, rarely its reason for being.

Listen to their chants: Jin Jiyan Azadi/Women Life Liberty!

           Glory and power to the women in Iran for serving us this challenge: If women (and men) in one of the most perfect police states are this unscared, then what are you doing to fight your oppressors?
          The thing about revolutions is that you can never unsee them. You can never see people who are no longer scared rise up.
          Their courage will set your very guts on fire. And put you on notice that you are next, whether you are an oppressor with a small o or a big-O Oppressor.
          Glory and power to the women in Iran who have seized the narrative and become object and subject.
           In too many revolutions women have died, been beaten, shot at, and sexually assaulted, fighting alongside men to rid their countries of that uppercase Patriarch yet so many lowercase patriarchs still oppress us.

We are no longer scared.


Visit ann arky's home at https://spiritofrevolt.info  

Freedom?

      The price you pay for not dressing according to the dictate of  authoritarian religious.

                                            Image courtesy of Iran Human Rights.

        Are the people of Iran finally going to throw off the shackles of authoritarian religion? Are they going to grasp the jewel of freedom, free from the rigours of patriarchy? Time will tell, but it is looking extremely positive in what the people are doing on the streets of Iran.


       The flames of uprising are once again burning in Iran. Yet, it seems different this time. A revolution is afoot, a feminist revolution.
      The first sparks of the revolution started in Saghez of Kurdistan, the home town of Mahsa Amini. Mahsa Amini was a 22-year-old Kurdish girl who was beaten to death by the police for “improper Hijab.” Mahsa was better lnown as Zhina among friends and family. In the Kurdish language, Zhina means life. The Islamic Republic of Iran snuffed out her life and countless others as sacrifices to the altars of Patriarchy, Religion, Racism, & Capitalism.
       The original sparks of revolt started by the chants "Jin, Jiyan, Azadi," "Woman, Life, Freedom" are now a evolution spreading to all 31 provinces and hundreds of cities. Even the ideological strongholds of the regime, Qom and Mashhad, are revolting. For the first time, the police are the direct target of people's ire. The Police have been driven back, beaten, and killed. Police cars flipped, burned, and destroyed. Police stations taken over and set aflame. People are no longer scared of them.
       The revolution is bearing fruits. Oshnavieh is the first city liberated and in full control of people on September 24th. We are but one step away from overthrowing the death cult that is Islamic Republic of Iran. It has yet to be seen if we would take that final step. But, the people of Iran have already proven that they shouldn't be underestimated.

A co-production between Antimídia, Federation of Anarchism Era and subMedia.
Visit ann arky's home at https://spiritofrevolt.info    

Saturday 1 February 2020

Religion, A Dictator.

     Because of America's brutal imperialist policies against Iran, some people will side with Iran, but we should never forget, Iran is just another corrupt authoritarian regime that wishes to control the people and enforce its own particular brand of dogma and ideology. Just like our own authoritarian states in the West, it has its secret police, it is riddled with corruption, it has its torturers, its large humanity killing prisons, its brutal minions who carry out the savage dictate of the regime. As in other states across the globe, there is no room for freedom and justice in their agenda. Corporate dictator, or religious dictator, is no choice at all.


       Only they who have lost their fear of death are in truly in love… My heart yearns for comrades who can hear my voice even though a more a dreadful and torturous prison awaits me for the crime of wanting to be a voice for the oppressed and my fellow inmates. Yet to be human is to endure the hardship of accepting responsibility, and there is no greater responsibility for the rebel than to stand with the oppressed. I must be the voice of people like Meysam, and thus refuse to fear Two Alef, 209, One Alef, and the regime’s other horrific prisons
        Meysam is an 18 year old youth from the Parand district who was arrested by agents of IRGC Tharallah military base for joining the protests against the increase in the price of gasoline that swept the country in November. Facing the charges of assembling and conspiring against the state, he is currently incarcerated in the 5th block of the Greater Tehran Central Prison. Despite his youth, Meysam’s hands are covered in callouses from being forced to be the sole breadwinner that his mother and sister depend on after losing his father to a traffic accident. He would work from dawn until midnight in the freezing cold of winter and the scorching heat of summer, delivering food on a motorcycle and pursuing his studies at night. After the sudden increase in the prices of gasoline, Meysam took to the streets to get his voice heard
       He says, “Even before the price increases, I was barely able to make enough to meet my family’s most basic needs. For me and others like me, traveling and leisure have always been out of reach like a mirage, but after the price increases, I can’t even afford the cost of rent, food, healthcare, and basic utilities. Who will answer our cries of agony with help?” Not only was there no help to be found, but his protestations were answered with blows from electric prods and batons. He was berated and tortured multiple times while his interrogator stood above him with a baton and electric prod and coerced him into confessing that he was taking orders from the United States and Israel and a member of so and so group dedicated to overthrowing the regime. Masyam asks “where the hell are America and Israel? I’ve never even traveled further than Shah Abdol-Azim’s Shrine! I just want to make enough income to live and an economy that isn’t corrupt. How does that make me an insurrectionist----
Read the full article HERE: 
Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Thursday 9 January 2020

Insanity Reigns.

        It is difficult to comment on the recent drone killing in Iraq by the irrational and impulsive action of Herr Trump, the possibilities for misery, carnage, chaos, death and destruction, involving millions of innocent people, is so multi-faceted that the mind draws back in horror and disbelief. However, it is a reality and must be faced and met with mass protests and direct action against all those who for whatever reason support this insanity. This is just the latest act of bloody imperialism by the US establishment, the latest in a long line that goes back more than a century. The blood of innocents drips from every dollar, countries become metropolises of misery and populations become an army of migrants, as a result of the US foreign policy, aided and abetted by its varies poodles dotted around the planet, including that previous blood soaked imperialist state of the UK.
     Sanity and humanity demands that we do our utmost to bring down this festering system of plundering the planet by the powerful for their own gain. As long as capitalism exists, power will dominate, wars will persist, death and destruction will be a daily occurrence for millions, and waves of displaced people will wash across the planet in search of safety and sanctuary. As always the rich and powerful will gain, the poor will always pay the price in sweat and blood. 
        Who can disagree with this extract from an article by Black Rose Anarchist Federation

In today's world, a daily occurrence for millions. 
        We share the view of fallen Black freedom fighter and Civil Rights icon Martin Luther King Jr. that “The greatest purveyor of violence in the world: my own government. I cannot be silent.” Much of the world has become a scorched battlefield for over two centuries as the dark shadow of U.S. imperialism, resource extraction, and capital accumulation first spanned the continent, then the globe. Through the colonization of indigenous peoples in the Americas to imperialist expansion around the world, this great purveyor of violence has displaced, imprisoned, tortured, enslaved, and killed untold millions. It is no surprise that in our time, through an endless “war on terror” that the darkest areas of this shadow have engulfed the broader Middle East.
        We stand in solidarity with the people of Iran and the Middle East who have suffered greatly from U.S. imperialism. The 1953 CIA-orchestrated coup that ousted Iran’s first democratically elected prime minister Mohammad Mosaddegh and brought the oppressive shah back to power made the ground fertile for the Iranian Revolution of 1979. Since then, the U.S. has been directly involved in destabilizing both Iran, and later, Iraq; first starting with the Iran-Iraq war (1980). The Gulf War of 1990-91, the intermittent bombings as well as the sanctions and blockade that lasted through the 90s, the 2003 invasion and ensuing occupation, and the battle against ISIS can more accurately be viewed as a three decade long war waged by the U.S. Intermittent threats of war against Iran, crippling economic sanctions and drone warfare have finally come to a tipping point. The world waits in horror as lines are drawn in the sand and Trump openly threatens to commit war crimes in Iran through the targeting of cultural sites. Millions of people who are desperately trying to escape the clutches of this endless war have fled their homes: the U.S. is guilty of creating the largest refugee and humanitarian crises since WWII. We demand: U.S. Out of the Middle East!
Read the full article HERE:
       My only disagreement with the above statement is that it is not "Out of the Middle East", it is off the face of the planet for all imperialism, capitalism.
Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Friday 13 December 2019

From Baghdad To Beirut---



Iraq 2019.
 
      It is difficult to grasp the full extent of what is happening in Iraq, Iran and other places where the people are battling the state on the streets. Most of our information is filtered through the mainstream media, and as most of us realise, that comes with its own particular bias. Getting information from the place of struggle can be difficult and can pass through many hands, receiving a little distortion as it travels.
 
 Iraq 2019.
 
      This morning I received this unsolicited email this morning, it may seem to be rather long, but certainly contains passion and appears to be from the area, and perhaps gives us a little bit more insight to what is going on. It is not my place to edit it, but I feel it is my place to pass it on, and hope you do likewise.
   I particularly like the paragraph---- This proletarian struggle is not an “anarchist” struggle, it is neither a “socialist” struggle, nor a struggle for the sake of democratic power, or the national State – it’s a revolutionary, class and international struggle against the capitalist dictatorship over life (over the Earth)… It is a struggle to liberate life from all forms of human slavery…
"From Baghdad to Beirut, no Shia no Sunni, let's continue the struggle."
    The Iraqi government is made up of all bourgeois factions in Iraq, and it is accepted by regional forces and the world bourgeoisie, but the proletariat tried to bring it down… The “Green Zone” in Baghdad is the centre of the world capitalism; the proletariat tried to occupy it and lost a lot of lives for it…The port of Basra is a global corridor for oil exports and international trade and proletariat blocked it, and tried to control it.
     The Iraqi police, security forces, special forces and military forces are forces of global capitalism (with the participation of Shia, Sunni, Christian, Kurdish, and Turkmen bourgeoisie, with a large numbers of regional and international forces, including troops of America and Europe, Turkey, Iran, etc.), but the proletariat attacked them, their centres and detachments in the streets, and as many as 650 proletarians have been killed by them and more than 20 thousand wounded (this is not to mention the number of abducted and imprisoned…).
      The proletariat in all rebellious areas of Iraq burned down the headquarters of the political parties (religious and national without exception), they burned down the houses of members of parliament and State officials and they also attacked security and police stations, media, judicial institutions and the Ministry of Justice, newspapers and television stations… By doing this, the proletariat attacked the whole State.
    According to the prime minister Adel Abd al-Mahdi, this movement destroyed the national economy (capitalism) in all its aspects. The proletariat in its struggle attacked without exception everything, any symbol, any person, any base attached to the history of the authority and repression including military, diplomatic institutions, trade centres and secret services, internal as well as external. All the attacks on the repressive forces of Pasdaran in the city of Karbala are not really anti-Iranian as the media said, but it is a part of the class action against the repressive forces and centres in all their forms just like the attack on the Green Zone and the other places. Isn’t it clear from proletarian united action and its slogans: “Down with all the thieves”, “From Baghdad to Beirut, no Shiite and no Sunni”, “No country, no work, we all stay in the street!”, “No country, no work until the downfall of the system” – that the proletariat targets counter-revolution in its totality, just like it did in Basra in September 2018!?
    The bourgeoisie has always tried to distort the class path of our revolutionary movement. They have resorted to various methods to empty the revolutionary content of our struggle; they create stories of conspiracy and call it names. All of this in order to cover up its bloody crackdown and the destruction of our revolutionary movement in bourgeois conflicts. The proletariat has risen up on a social level against all the exploiters and it intends to terminate the whole of their power.
      The proletariat understands very much that external and internal capitalists (Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds, Christians, Jews…), the wealthiest from all over the world are part of the State and they are all united in exploiting the humanity, therefore, proletarian struggle is without a doubt a united struggle against all of them…
    The militant proletariat does not allow anyone to represent it; it has no demands and it does not negotiate. It is not attached to any political programme… Isn’t this rebellion a deep class struggle against the capitalist system in its entirety? The only programme of the proletariat is its determination to continue and direct the unified struggle against the dictatorship of Capital and State.
     “We are against all of you, and we take everything.” That’s the autonomy of the class and the strength of the struggle of our movement… And therefore, it is not easy for the State to extinguish or to root out this movement. The proletariat is not in a waiting situation or in a depressed mood… Since the beginning of the movement and until now, even with massive repression and murdering of the State, this movement continues and it is expanding the scope of its struggles and tactics day after day. For example, in Baghdad, the movement formed combat units and spread all around the city to interrupt the traffic, and take control of the bridges and important points. It set up its collective coordinating activities to extend and expand its struggle to plan the next day and the next target, it published leaflets about its struggle, and it treated injured comrades… all of this is the coordination, organization and expansion of their struggle capacity.
     The proletarian struggles in the past always took energy from each other. That is how the struggle continues and exercises its class interests and internationalism as well. By breaking the geographical borders, ideological, economical and democratic frameworks and the national State… this movement targets the Capital and global capitalism. And today the exactly same struggle exists in reality. The proletariat nowadays (from Haiti, France, Hong Kong, Egypt, Latin America, Lebanon to Iraq and Iran) is in the same struggle, we are fighting the same enemy, we have the same interests and the same hope: the overthrow of capitalism and the realization of community of human life without wage labour, exploitation, profit, Capital, work, pollution, injustice, wars and destruction.
     This proletarian struggle is not an “anarchist” struggle, it is neither a “socialist” struggle, nor a struggle for the sake of democratic power, or the national State – it’s a revolutionary, class and international struggle against the capitalist dictatorship over life (over the Earth)… It is a struggle to liberate life from all forms of human slavery… If today young militants have come out on the street and they take a lead in the struggle and heavily participate in it, it is something natural!
      Because this generation, while running daily from the catastrophe of capital, is dreaming of life. They are those who have no stability in life… what they have today may not last until tomorrow. What they feel was close to them today; tomorrow seems to be very far. The greed of capitalism, its wars, and its successive disasters left them in a constant struggle. This situation intensifies more and more at the global level and becomes a hell that pushes the proletariat into the struggle… Their struggle is a struggle of life against this capitalist hell. The proletarians in the struggle understand capitalism and its catastrophe and they feel alive and they are happy in their struggle for life.
     The proletarian struggle is the struggle of the exploited class against the world capitalism. It is a struggle for life, against the exploitative and deadly relations of the global Capital. The proletariat continues to struggle: from France to Lebanon, from Iraq to Chile, from Hong Kong to Iran… and calls upon all other neighbouring areas where it is possible to unite and to co-ordinate class action in this struggle against capitalism.
     From our region the participation of the proletariat in Turkey, Israel and Iran… blocks the possibilities of the capitalist war and pushes our international class war towards a better perspective. Down with exploitation and oppression… Down with war… Down with capitalism… For the continuation of the class war all over the World.

From the comrades of international struggle

Internationalist Proletarians

Middle East

November 2019
International and Class Communication: internationalist@riseup.net
Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Tuesday 26 November 2019

Truly A Winter Of Discontent.

     There is no doubt that this year is different. Yes, there has always been protests in this unjust economic system, but this year there are many more and they are more intense with greater numbers on the streets, and they go on much longer, months, and still continuing. Have The people of Iran joined this world wide revolutionary movement?
     The Anarchist Union of Iran and Afghanistan believes that the Islamic Republic of Iran’s regime will not hesitate to massacre millions of Iranians, like it has done in Syria and Iraq as well as in Iran these these last few days. Therefore, the Anarchist Union of Iran and Afghanistan is prepared to declare that it will cooperate with all Kurdish, Arab and Baloch armed opposition forces. With respect to the widespread repression of defenseless people in Iran, we must be able to provide them with the right tools to defend themselves, before there are more dead and the people’s movement has been permanently suppressed. Therefore the need to form an armed revolutionary front to support and defend the people against the Islamic regime’s executioners is urgent and necessary. If it is possible to transport weapons to people inside Iran, you should not hesitate for a moment to prevent more people from being bled and buried. The duty of the revolutionary and radical opposition outside of Iran is to provide logistical and strategic support to the struggles and resistance of the people inside Iran
     I don't agree with everything in the following article but it is an excellent source to see the extent of these prolonged mass protests and gives hope that they will be joined by others rather than morph into some sort of formal agreement with the various states. Our support and solidarity could help immensely in preventing this morphing from happening.  From Democracy Without Borders: 

Youth celebrating the Lebanese revolution in 2019. Photo by Vicken Vincent Avakian with kind permission (source)
     This year has seen an extraordinary number of significant mass protests in over twenty countries or territories, many of which in a national context represented the biggest in recent times. They are often spontaneous, with a distinctly revolutionary nature. In many cases protesters would face a serious risk of arrest, injury or death. The ruling class, government or even the whole system of government, are the targets. Corruption, authoritarianism and/or austerity are their key motivators. ------
And:
    -------Obviously protests occur constantly, and we haven’t done a thorough data analysis comparing this year with historical averages. However, it’s generally accepted that the current protests aren’t normal. CNN’s Fareed Zakaria called them  “this autumn of protest”, and noted that “the politics of each of these movements seems quite distinct. But they are all occurring against a worrisome backdrop: a collapse of [global] economic growth”, which is now at its lowest point since the 2008 crash.
       We can take the line of thinking further and note that these various uprisings are in fact different theatres of the same conflict. 
      Protesters may be waving their national flags, and speaking of national rebirth – not global justice, but as the example of Ecuador especially shows, these national transformations can take place, but they must currently do so in spite of the prevailing global system, which is institutionally incompatible with the needs of the world’s population, captured by an undemocratic, ahistorical ideology which fetishises the balancing of national budgets with same year tax revenues which effectively prohibits effective development strategies, such as the provision of basic services or redistribution.
For the list of mass protests continue reading:
Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk  

Saturday 27 July 2019

A Torch, Lighting The Way To The Future.

       From Japan to Brazil, from Russia to South Africa, from Europe to America, from Peru to Indonesia, anarchism's torch burns, sometime bright like a beacon showing what the future can be, and some times as a flickering candle, but we are everywhere, and we are growing. No matter how "prosperous" or how poor the country, no matter whether the state is "liberal democracy" or authoritarian dictatorship, no matter if the country is torn apart by imperialist wars, we are there, still raising the flag of freedom and justice for all.
This from AMW English:
 
 
AMW interviewed comrades from the Anarchist Union of Iran and Afghanistan (Asranarshism) about the potential war between Iran and the United States and building international solidarity with anarchists around the world.

As anarchists, what is your analysis of the threat of war occurring between the US and Iranian state?
Today, while we write this response, an American drone was targeted by the Islamic Republic, so now it’s very difficult for all of us anarchists to provide a uniform analysis. We can only predict what will happen because we cannot observe behind-the-scenes communications between states and many other issues. Only different hypotheses can be considered and assessed. Your question is focused on what, as anarchists, what is our analysis of the threat of war between these two states? It must first be said, naturally, anarchists oppose state wars, but how does this opposition affect wars of states is another discussion. We will always remain anti-war. A war between states is at the service of states and capitalism, and the Iranian people must strive to put an end to this deadly war and conflict, and the state militia and infantry cannot go to war and must have their own independent line. It should not remain unsaid that a large part of the Iranian people are waiting for the Islamic Republic to weaken so they can dissolve the dictatorship and theocracy ruling Iran—and us anarchists will be alongside the people and in the streets and we will do whatever we can do for the revolution and the fall of the Islamic Republic. People in Iran have experienced the devastating 8 year war between Iran and Iraq; however some people in Iran have been reluctant to end the Islamic Republic after 40 years of atrocities and unfortunately, they have given assent to the US war against the Iranian state and see it as the easiest possible way to break the evil Islamic Republic. Although they know war will destroy all the infrastructure, they say that the last forty years of the Islamic Republic’s record has been nothing less than war; it plundered the country’s wealth, destroyed the environment, the lakes, and wetlands, brought the people of Iran poverty and misery, executed more than 100,000 people, and expelled 8 million, setting them adrift around the world.
You have criticized the defence of the Iranian regime by some Western leftists who call it “anti-imperialist.” How can revolutionaries effectively oppose both the fascism of the Iranian state and imperialist intervention?
The target of absolutist and state-oriented anti-imperialist critique is only American imperialism, but we are more open to this than some so-called anarchists or communists such as Noam Chomsky or Slavoj Zizek who defend the Islamic Republic of Iran. The silence of these intellectuals about the crimes of the Islamic Republic repressing the Iranian people and the severe crackdown on anarchists, Islamic Republic crimes against immigrants, especially Afghan immigrants (who are deprived of their basic human rights and have been slaughtered in the Syrian war for the promise of temporary residence in Iran), and the repression of women, workers, and students is unacceptable. In fact, Chomsky and his like are silent about the Islamic Republic because it is a state that appears to stand against American imperialism and if they are presented with the choice between the ruling government of Iran and the Iranian people, they will choose power. This is a tragedy because the power and authority that has crystallized in the Iranian government has conquered and fascinated them, and the fate of the Iranian people does not matter to them—and instead of always opposing power and defending individual freedom and the collective freedom, they are entranced by power and forget about freedom and opposing domination of the Iranian government; instead they examine this major contradiction through Marxist theory and not on the basis of liberty and anarchist libertarianism.
What historical revolutionary movements and figures are particularly inspiring or relevant for your movement today in Iran and Afghanistan?
The failure of state communism globally on the one hand and the failed, unsuccessful political developments in Iran and Afghanistan on the other hand led youth to gravitate toward liberal and libertarian alternatives that were new to them. The Internet, anarchist artists and anarchist activists abroad have helped in this process. Since we are anarchist militants, individuals and revolutionary movements close to our tendency are most relevant to us. But if we were to name some of them, we would include the Paris Commune of 1871, the Spanish Civil War, the Chicago anarchist workers, the Kronstadt sailors, the Black Army and Nestor Makhno, Emiliano Zapata, Dorothy Day, the AANES (Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria) and Abdullah Öcalan, the Chiapas Zapatistas, Japanese anarchists, Bakunin, Emma Goldman, Louise Michel, and Camillo Berneri.
As your website has published articles on the death of Lorenzo Orsetti and repression of Indonesian anarchists this past May Day, would you like to comment about these two important moments for the anarchist movement internationally?
So far, more than 500 international fighters have been killed in Syria fighting for the AANES and mostly in the war with ISIL. Many of them were our fellow international anarchists and Lorenzo Orsetti is one. We have always tried to identify international fighters who were anarchists fighting for our ideals to commemorate these comrades by introducing them to our audience and we emphasize that anarchists are idealists without pretensions and they are mostly anonymous and only called International Fighters, and main-stream platforms use it to deliberately hide anarchism so they do not advertise anarchists accidentally. Of course fallen anarchists do not care because they did not fight for power or fame, but to take revolutionary action. As you mention comrades, anarchist fighters in Rojava and the presence of anarchists in Indonesia are two significant historical moments, and it is very important to record these historical moments and our responsibility to highlight them. We emphasize the revolutionary nature of anarchists by calling attention to fallen comrades and encourage our young audience to radicalize.
Are there any new development in the situation of anarchist prisoner Soheil Arabi?
Anarchist prisoner Soheil Arabi was imprisoned in Ward 1, Hall 9 within the Greater Tehran Prison and is currently serving his 11 year prison sentence. He has been on a hunger strike to protest the horrendous conditions in the prison, which includes: violent behaviour by prison authorities, the spread of drug use among prisoners, lack of prison maintenance and provisioning, confessions coerced with shockers and batons, not separating prisoners by crimes, absence of adequate accommodations and sanitation facilities, denial of right to treatment, and an infestation of bedbugs and lice. The hunger strike happened because the prison authorities ignored Soheil’s repeated requests to address prison conditions. While performing his hunger strike, Soheil Arabi was transferred to the dispensary in the Greater Tehran Prison on June 20, 2019 after his health deteriorated severely. Farangis Mazloum, the brave mother of Soheil Arabi, was arrested in Tehran at her home on Monday July, 22 2019 by eight members of the security forces. She has been transferred to an unknown location. Anarchist comrade Soheil Arabi should have been released last year, but he was tried again last year in October and sentenced to another 3 years. After the last time he was tortured and beaten, he was not sent to the hospital despite a groin injury and broken nose. Recently, a 21-year-old political prisoner named Alireza Shir Mohammad Ali, his mother’s only son, was deliberately killed by two other prisoners with a knife in the same prison—this is one of the methods the Iranian state uses to physically remove political prisoners. We are worried about comrade Soheil because there is no security in the Islamic Republic’s prisons. Of course, besides Soheil, there are several anarchist prisoners in Iranian prisons. On May 1, 2019, fifty participants at a May Day demonstration, including women activists Neda Naji, Marzieh Amiri, Anisha Asadollahi, and Atefeh Rangriz were arrested and detained by security forces and have not been released. There are others that we cannot name for security reasons
What are some of the ways in which you have been organizing in your communities?
Anarchists in Iran and Afghanistan have clandestine activities that cannot be shared externally, because of the very dangerous security conditions, so that the secret police in Iran do not know how to fight anarchist organizations and do not know where we are operating. If we make our organizing, campaigns, and areas of activity public, then the Iranian state will focus their security institutions on them and create security traps. After the ten-day protests in more than 100 cities in Iran beginning on December 28, 2017, security agencies realized that people were organizing without leadership and, as a result, were at risk. Of course, when we began our activities 10 years ago, security institutions were at risk because since 1979, they had been able to suppress all of the opposition in Iran and quash them in the eyes of the people, and for three decades of repression, it was easy to imagine that no politics were attractive to young people and women, and that they were comfortable with the political structure, parties and currents. The regime was shocked by the emergence of new and fresh political currents, which on the one hand, was welcomed by young people, women and workers, and on the other hand, the regime itself had no knowledge about this new political thinking, its main activists, and how it spreads. For this reason, we and other political activists asked the questions: what would the regime do to counter the spread of anarchism through society? And what methods of oppression will they use to repress anarchists? Until the answers to these questions reveal themselves over-time, security agencies are opposing us and by using their Internet and propaganda facilities, they created a virtual faction and ordered them to create parallel organizations. By creating a counterfeit political movement called “anarchism,” it destroys the anarchist movement and pushes teenagers and young people in the desired direction of the state.
What issues do you see percolating in Iran and Afghanistan that would make people more responsive and interested in anarchism?
In Iran and Afghanistan, cases such as patriarchy, religion, limited individual liberty, lack of social justice, ecological collapse and the extinction of many animal and plant species, the theocracy in Iran, and the lack of alternative, revolutionary opposition in Iran and Afghanistan. Anarchism is attractive because anarchist libertarianism and its emphasis on the importance of individual and secular freedom and radicalization, the importance of women’s rights, the protection of animals and the environment, the opposition to all hierarchy, and opposition to authority are all essential for Iranian society and strongly catches people’s attention.
How can anarchists in other parts of the world act in solidarity with the movement in Iran and Afghanistan?
We can say that so far anarchists in other parts of the world have been supporting the anarchist movement inn Iran and Afghanistan very well, and shared our struggles through interviews and voluntary translation of interviews on their own websites in different languages. Our anarchist comrades supported Soheil Arabi and other actions that we cannot mention for security reasons. Because we are all anarchists, we have a deep interest in the global anarchist movement and in the vastness of the world, our range of struggles is wide and all anarchists face many anarchist struggles; however they do as much as they can for the anarchist movement in Iran and Afghanistan. In any case, the struggle continues and all kinds of anarchist support from the international anarchist movement will continue.
In the long term, how do you think anarchists can build stronger connections internationally to support revolutionary movements in a way that is not merely reactive to crises or repression?
Now the left movement and communist movement are facing a crisis, they do not have a strong presence at the international level or in international struggles, they have largely lost their revolutionary and militant characters, and even the parliamentary left is facing a crisis, even liberals face a crisis—but anarchists do not face this situation and they have not lost their revolutionary character and are still pragmatic. Anywhere in the world that has the smallest movement, the whole international anarchist movement focuses on it and stands up like in Syria, where several hundred international anarchists have fallen in the fight against ISIS alongside the SDF. Yes, we also think that in the long run anarchists can create create stronger international ties to support revolutionary movements abroad. They should not only be involved in everyday struggles and should attract many other popular political tendencies and movements, as we do. This is the very nature of the revolutionary and honestly also of anarchists: their pragmatism and the importance they invest in international struggles provides the groundwork for the practical support of revolutionary movements. The next important point is that anarchists from different parts of the world communicate with one another through their websites and email to share news about each other, which means they have a true and broader political worldview, and that they are quick to learn of problems and struggles, so they can rapidly support their international peers.
Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Friday 14 June 2019

Don't Iraq Iran!


        My ears are now hearing the familiar beat of the drums of war. Iraq, Libya, Syria, North Korea and Iran have been on the US agenda for regime change for almost 20 years, perhaps more. They have destroyed Iraq and Libya, they have  decimated Syria, Though the Assad regime still holds the power, that battle is still ongoing, to America, it is unfinished business. That now moves Iran up the list of regime change by the US and its puppet regimes. The reason those Middle East countries were labelled "evil", was the fact that their gas and oil reserves were nationalised, that doesn't suit the big boys in the Western financial Mafia. That pool of wealth has to be brought into coffers of the Western corporate world. Another country that has felt the wrath of the mighty dollar is Venezuela, yes, its oil and gas is nationalised, that makes them "evil".

Winter.

Dark malefic clouds crowd the sky
winds carry the stench of carrion to every nostril,
the crazy ape has followed the faculty of hawks.
All around stand crows, magpies, jackdaws, vultures,
edacious eyes anticipating their putrid feast.
A weary Cassandra laments;
doves, hearts weeping for a better yesterday
forsake their olive branches.

         The following is from Code Pink:


      BREAKING NEWS: Just hours after the attack on the Japanese and Norweigan oil tankers in the Gulf of Oman, Secretary of State Pompeo was already blaming Iran. He is using the attack to push his agenda of going to war with Iran, just like the Bush administration manufactured a crisis to go to war with Iraq. Take action right now. Tell Congress: Don’t let Trump take us to war with Iran.
        The attacks came as Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wrapped up his trip to Iran to help ease tensions between the U.S. and Iran. We don’t know who is behind the sabotage, but whoever is behind it wants to escalate the conflict between the two nations.
        The only REAL news here is that the Trump administration’s maximum pressure policy is pushing us closer to war. It’s the Trump administration’s bellicose actions, withdrawing from the nuclear agreement, imposing brutal sanctions, and deploying warships closer to the Persian Gulf to “send a clear and unmistakable message to Iran” that is driving this escalation. The facts of this latest attack on the oil tankers are not clear, but we know that we can’t trust anything warmonger Pompeo and serial liar John Bolton tell us about Iran without providing internationally verified evidence. And no matter who was responsible for this attack, the solution is mediation.
        What’s happening right now with Iran is all too reminiscent of the prelude to the war with Iraq in 2003, when Bush’s “intelligence” showed that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction — which turned out to be all lies. Now in 2019, Trump’s “intelligence” insists that Iran is responsible for the attacks in the Gulf of Oman.
       Key members of Trump’s administration, especially John Bolton and Mike Pompeo, have been looking for a pretext for war with Iran. So have their allies in Saudi Arabia, the Emirates and Israel. Against the will of Congress, the Trump administration is trying to sell more weapons to Saudi Arabia and the UAE under the guise of a national emergency — the emergency being Iran. And now the warmongers in the administration are using the incident in the Gulf to try to create that emergency. The Middle East is still coping with the horrible consequences of the Iraq war. Send a message to Congress now that they can’t let the Trump administration take us to war with Iran.
Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Thursday 9 May 2019

With Sickening Regularity, Another Anarchist Beaten By Prison Guards.

 
      States across the world, day in and day out, use their rigged judicial system to heap harsh repression on those who would dare to speak out against their legislated injustices. What they bring to law, no matter how barbaric, unjust or cruel that legislation may be, they will enforce with the full force of their tools of repression, carried out by duped fools who see it as their duty to do so.
      Anarchist who stand on the principles of justice, equality and freedom, are usually the most vocal in their criticism of these injustices built into our society. So it is no surprise that anarchists will continually be the target of the repressive and authoritarian states, that today, cover the globe. We could fill a library with the names of anarchists who have suffered brutal violence, and on many occasions, death at the hands of the various states across the planet.
         The forms of repression may vary from state to state, some more barbaric than others, but the aim is the same, to silence dissent, to create subservience. Conditions totally unacceptable to any freethinking mind, and it is with that band of humanity that anarchist will always stand. Each and every one that makes that stand demands our full support and solidarity.
        The following case is just one, in one country, but we all know this can be repeated, many times over, in varying degrees, in any country on the planet. 
This from Freedom News:


Iranian anarchist prisoner Soheil Arabi severely beaten by prison guards

World, May 8th
       Anarchist political prisoner Soheil Arabi, who is detained in Fashafoyeh (the Greater Tehran Prison), was sent to Firoozabadi Hospital after being injured from beatings by prison guards.
       Soheil Arabi was arrested by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) agents at his home in Tehran in November 2013 and charged with insulting the Prophet Mohammad in his postings on social media about Atena Daemi: a human rights activist and a political prisoner in Iran. In August 2014, Arabi was sentenced to death.
        Soheil had experienced prison torture in the past. Most recently, he was summoned, interrogated and severely beaten for his connection with the letter he wrote from the Greater Tehran Prison about the condition of the prisoners in Fashafoyeh “Greater Tehran” Prison. In result, he has suffered an injury to his testicular area. Following the hospital visit, he was returned to prison without treatment. He was also denied access to a telephone and visitors.
         In November 2018, Soheil Arabi sent a message from prison on the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women:

“Humanity deserves the best.


        Speak of fighting violence against women! Of women’s struggle against oppression, discrimination, and violence by society; Of violence in Evin and Qarchak to the Varamin hunger strike; Of the abuse and threats interrogators make against women; Of tears shed at meetings; combating violence against women is, without a doubt, one of the most important demands of the liberation movement and we are all fighting against gender discrimination.
         The discrimination that systems have taught us where women are men’s property and tools to serve them. This was the thought that had me ashamed of silence.
        Silence against violence is betrayal. Rise up and shout: Shout, “my mother does not deserve violence, my sister and I do not deserve misogyny”.
          Stand up and tear down the barriers, you warrior! I bow down to all those who stood up against gender discrimination and violence, particularly violence against women, and paid the price of cold, damp prison cells, at the foot of the gallows and under the lash of whips.
        I bow down to the mothers who raised freedom fighters; those who saw violence and stood against it.
         The word “violence” needs to be erased and efforts to eliminate it require a humane society. Now is the time to stand up against the clenched fists raised at women and liberators. So I stand up too with mighty women liberators shouting to eliminate violence against women, and not to be silent against violence.

Rise up so that our children may learn humanity deserves the best.

Soheil Arabi November, 2018 Greater Tehran Central Penitentiary”
Sources: The Anarchist Union of Afghanistan and Iran, Prameń
Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Tuesday 13 November 2018

History Should Teach Us Something??

      I came across this little piece I penned at the start of the illegal invasion of Iraq, for the paper I produced, "The Anarchist Critic". Since then the imperialist slaughter has washed across Libya and Syria with Iran in the cross-hairs. At the time it was difficult to drink in the horror and terror inflicted on the ordinary people of Iraq by the Western imperialist's callous and brutal "Shock and Awe", a deliberate action of savagery unleashed on the innocent, children, elderly and infirm. All because one man and his team wouldn't play ball with the Western imperialists. Since then the faces of the figureheads of Western imperialism have changed, but the policy is still the same. We have seen the faces of Bush, Clinton, Blair and Cameron come and go, we now have the Trump and May duo, but that's all that has changed, the brutal imperialist bloodshed continues unabated.
     When will it finally sink in, that voting to change the faces of these figureheads, these puppets of corporate imperialism, will change nothing. They say that doing the same thing over and over again but expecting a different result, is one of the first signs of insanity, is that where we are at now?
From 2003:
IF THEY WERE COMEDIANS WE COULD LAUGH AT THEM.

         However, these two arrogant Christian fundamentalists nutters are for real. Their brutal Afghanistan and Iraq bloodbaths have turned the world into a nightmare, a breeding ground for other fundamentalist nutters to pursue their "God given" dogmatic beliefs. The number of innocent civilian deaths cannot be justifies on the banner of "A good cause". The impoverished country of Afghanistan has been returned to the stone age where 5% have access to fresh water, 25% of all children are dead by the age of five, 400 a month are blown up by land mines and civil war festers just below the surface. Conservative estimates put the civilian deaths in Iraq, since the illegal invasion at 15,000 and still rising. Coalition aggressors deaths nearing the 1,000 mark and an estimated 8,000 US soldiers injured. Economically the costs of this brutal, illegal Iraq adventure are put at $100 billion, (tax payers money of course) and most agree that this is a grossly under estimated figure. Iraq's infrastructure is in tatter and once again it is the innocent civilians and their children that have to try to survive in this Bush/Blair disaster.
         Getting rid of the Bush/Blair "God disciple duo" is not the answer, they are merely the selected strong-arm war lords of the corporate world, doing its bidding, (with a little help from God). They would be replaced with a different personality but the same brutal agenda would still be pursued. We have to crush the system that welds the state apparatus and corporate power into a brutal force that controls the worlds resources. We have to bring all the world's resources under the control of the ordinary people. The state and its repressive apparatus must be dismantled, multi-national corporations taken over by those who work in them and moulded to the benefit of all, a new society created, one that is based on free association, voluntary co-operation and mutual aid. Tomorrow must belong to us the ordinary people or there is no tomorrow.
                                                                                              ann arky.
Visit ann arky's home at radicalglasgow.me.uk