Osanloo given membership of Unite the union

Len McCluskey, general secretary of the UK’s Unite trade union, today conferred honorary membership on campaigner for union rights Mansour Osanloo, who is being held in jail in Iran.

He made the presentation at a meeting of the executive board of the ITF in London. Mansour Osanloo’s union, the Vahed Syndicate of Tehran bus drivers, is an ITF member, and the organisation has campaigned unceasingly for his release.

Len McLuskey said: “Mansour Osanloo is an inspiration to us. Like his union, ours also includes bus drivers, and it is a pleasure to in some small way recognise the incredible work he has done for his members and for the cause of free trade unions across the globe. We will not stand-by as workers, their representatives and families face physical attack, imprisonment and even murder by some of world’s most repressive regimes.

“We are delighted to make him an honorary member of the UK’s largest trade union. We only wish we could do it face to face and must continue to organise globally to ensure that one day soon we can.”

ITF general secretary David Cockroft said: “Mansour is a figurehead for all the union leaders and members detained in Iran. He is ill and vulnerable, and a particular target. His treatment by the Iranian authorities is a running sore on the reputation of that nation. It is only constant and vigorous protests that make the authorities there pull back from the even worse handling of him that they periodically try to get away with. Today’s symbolic gesture by Unite takes its place alongside the granting of membership by a number of ITF member unions as a reminder to Iran that Mansour is known and supported around the world.”

Source: Unite The Union