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Iranian communists call for mass struggle against 'dictatorial regime'

IRANIAN communists called for co-ordinated protests and direct struggle against Tehran’s “dictatorial regime” yesterday after at least one person was killed in a weekend demonstration over water scarcity.

The communist Tudeh Party of Iran (TPI) said building independent trade unions and civil society organisations to defend peace and democracy was the only way to save the country from the threat of external intervention and “to move in the direction of putting an end to the regime of oppression, ignorance, dictatorship in our homeland.”

Large popular demonstrations have taken place in the southern port city of Khorramshahr over the last few days, with growing anger over a severe water shortage in the country

Protesters chanted anti-government slogans, blaming official mismanagement for exacerbating one of Iran’s worst droughts for decades.

But police attacked Sunday’s demonstration, using tear gas and live ammunition. Many people were injured and at least one person is reported to have been killed in the clashes.

The country’s economic crisis is deepening after the reimposition of sanctions due to US withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal.

The TPI said: “The people have reached their limits.”

Demonstrations in the capital Tehran caused the closure of the city’s bazaar, the traditional power base of the Iranian regime, amid an economic crisis caused by the collapse of the exchange value of the Iranian rial against the dollar.

But Iranian Chief Justice Sadegh Larijani warned: “We will not hesitate under any circumstances to deal with these people. We warn that there will be a severe punishment for the disruption of the economic system of the country and, if we judge there to be a case of ‘corruption on earth,’ we will consider the death penalty for them."

TPI international secretary Navid Shomali told the Star that the political system of Iran is based on the “absolute rule of a medieval tyranny,” with the judiciary propping up a “rotten anti-people system.”

He said only a few months had passed since the uprising of people “against oppression, despotism, deprivation and hunger in 80 cities across Iran,” with daily protests continuing.

But Mr Shomali warned against foreign intervention, calling for the people of Iran to “organise the direct struggle against the dictatorial regime” by building strong independent unions and civil society organisations.

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