They Started With The Bus Drivers….

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I don’t intend to make this a long post. I think we’ve already explored most of the issues, (and here, and here), but I do feel we need to be vigilant about what is happening on a day to day basis in Iran. This story seems to confirm the general picture I’d been forming:

Clashes erupted between Iran’s State Security Forces and bus drivers and union activists in the Iranian capital Tehran on Saturday after authorities arrested activists in an attempt to prevent a demonstration that had been planned for the day, local residents told Iran Focus.

Agents of the Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS), Iran’s notorious secret police, raided the homes of bus drivers in Tehran in the early hours of the morning, arresting hundreds of bus union activists and in some cases their relatives as well, one resident reported.

Those arrested have been taken to unknown locations.

This is an extremely repressive administration, which seems to be bent on systematically tightening its grip and eliminating all serious opposition. If you want a run-down on the various opinions about what to do about the situation, you could do worse than start here.

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About Edward Hugh

Edward 'the bonobo is a Catalan economist of British extraction. After being born, brought-up and educated in the United Kingdom, Edward subsequently settled in Barcelona where he has now lived for over 15 years. As a consequence Edward considers himself to be "Catalan by adoption". He has also to some extent been "adopted by Catalonia", since throughout the current economic crisis he has been a constant voice on TV, radio and in the press arguing in favor of the need for some kind of internal devaluation if Spain wants to stay inside the Euro. By inclination he is a macro economist, but his obsession with trying to understand the economic impact of demographic changes has often taken him far from home, off and away from the more tranquil and placid pastures of the dismal science, into the bracken and thicket of demography, anthropology, biology, sociology and systems theory. All of which has lead him to ask himself whether Thomas Wolfe was not in fact right when he asserted that the fact of the matter is "you can never go home again".

4 thoughts on “They Started With The Bus Drivers….”

  1. This is exactly how Iran was when I lived there the first 13 years of my life. It is a completely corrupt, evil government. As has been often talked about, the majority of Iranians don’t like the government. Everyday you were reminded of how repressive it is. I remember speaking English with my friends when the secret police were around so they couldn’t understand us. Which says as much about the state as it does towards common Iranians yearning towards the West.

  2. Will, I assume this was under Khomeini?
    What’s your view on the possibility of peaceful change – is there still a Khatami coalition among those common Iranians? If so, does it count for much?

  3. Busdrivers? There´s more, a few days ago I read an article about a Dutchman who visited a heavy metal concert at a university whilst in Iran.

    They allow heavy metal in Iran!? Well sort of, in a hush hush way and only if the band plays very very softly, doesn´t sing the lyrics (the public has the murmur the lyrics themselves) anything that goes beyond that or looks even remotely like political incitement gets you arrested.

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