Iraqi Labor Leaders Spread Message of Peace and Solidarity

“The struggle of Iraqi unionists begins each morning when we go out onto the streets on our way to work,” Iraqi labor leader Adnan Rashed told a rapt audience at Cornell University in New York City. “We have to stay 300 feet away from every soldier, or else we will be shot.”

Rashed was one of six labor leaders from Iraq who came to the U.S. in June to tell the American people how Iraqi workers are struggling to reclaim their country and their right to form unions. Hosted by U.S. Labor against the War, they spent one week in Washington, D.C. and a second week traveling around the country. They met with fellow labor leaders, workers, media, congressional representatives, religious leaders and others.

Abernathy Associates provided publicity assistance to U.S. Labor against the War, resulting in articles in Reuters, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, San Francisco Bay-Guardian, San Francisco Chronicle, San Jose Mercury News, Minnesota Star-Tribune, Washington Times and others.

Everywhere they went, the six expressed their opposition to the occupation and their desire to have their country back. They also talked about how the majority of Iraqi workers are still denied the right to organize – thanks to a Saddam-era law that the occupation authorities left on the books.

These six men are at the forefront of a burgeoning progressive movement in Iraq that hopes to rebuild their country by and for the people. They have led efforts to oppose the U.S. government’s push to privatize all Iraq industries. Despite the fact that they lack official recognition, several of their unions have led protests and strikes – winning higher wages for workers and forcing American companies like Kellogg Brown and Root, a subsidiary of Halliburton, to employ Iraqi workers instead of foreign workers.