15.01.2026

No return to past

In the protests that gave rise to the current uprising in Iran, the perspectives of labour activists should have been central. Instead, because they ran against the dominant currents of warmongering and Pahlavi monarchist nostalgia, their voices were marginalised in both the Persian-language and international media.

As usual, attention was lavished on Iranian figures who openly justify war and are funded by the United States and Israel, or on those who - offering no principled opposition to foreign intervention, monarchist reaction, separatism or the Mujahedin - treat the mere overthrow of the existing government as a universal remedy.

For this reason, and in order to make clear to a global audience that these views are far from universal, we aim to amplify the voices of labour activists in Iran. We ask you, at least once, to listen to a different voice: one emerging from the deepest experiences of suffering, exploitation and class oppression.

Popular protests and strikes across cities throughout the country have now gone on for two weeks. Despite an intensified security crackdown, the heavy deployment of police and security forces, and widespread violence against protestors, the movement remains broad, dynamic and diverse. According to reports, protests have taken place at no fewer than 174 locations in 60 cities across 25 provinces, with hundreds of demonstrators arrested. Tragically, at least 35 protestors - including children - have been killed during this period.

From December 2017 to November 2019, and again in September 2022, Iran’s oppressed people have repeatedly taken to the streets to demonstrate their rejection of the prevailing political and economic order and its structures of exploitation and inequality. These movements are not driven by nostalgia for the past, but by the determination to build a future free from the domination of capital - one grounded in freedom, equality, social justice and human dignity.

While expressing our solidarity with popular struggles against poverty, unemployment, discrimination and repression, we categorically oppose any return to a past marked by inequality, corruption and injustice. We believe that genuine liberation can only be achieved through the conscious, organised leadership and participation of the working class and oppressed people themselves - not through the revival of outdated and authoritarian forms of power.

Workers, teachers, retirees, nurses, students, women and especially young people - despite mass repression, arrests, dismissals and relentless economic hardship - continue to stand at the forefront of these struggles. In this context, the Syndicate of Workers of Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company (Vahed) stresses the necessity of sustaining independent, conscious and organised forms of protest.

We have stated repeatedly, and we reaffirm once again: the path to liberation for workers and the oppressed does not lie in the imposition of leaders from above, nor in reliance on foreign powers, nor through factions within the ruling establishment. It lies in unity, solidarity and the building of independent organisations in workplaces, communities and at the national level. We must not allow ourselves to once again become victims of power struggles and the interests of the ruling classes.

Vahed also strongly condemns any promotion, justification or support for military intervention by foreign governments, including the United States and Israel. Such interventions lead not only to the destruction of civil society and the killing of civilians, but also provide further pretexts for repression and violence by the state. Past experience has shown that western hegemonic powers place no value whatsoever on the freedom, livelihoods or rights of the Iranian people.

We demand the immediate and unconditional release of all detainees and insist on the identification and prosecution of those responsible for ordering and carrying out the killing of protestors.

Long live freedom, equality and class solidarity. The path forward for workers and the oppressed is unity and organisation.