23.02.2006

Basra quagmire

Yassamine Mather (Iran Bulletin Middle East Forum and Critique) calls for solidarity with the Basra oil workers

On February the 14, the provincial council in Basra in southern Iraq announced that it had suspended relations with UK military forces over a video showing troops abusing Iraqi civilians. Three days later Iran's foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, called for the "immediate withdrawal" of UK troops from Basra.

Both announcements mark the growing tension between pro-Iranian shia forces and British military as well as the pro-British shia groups in southern Iraq at a time when rivalries in the run-up to the forthcoming regional elections are creating tension between all the groups.

The conflict has taken sections of the British media by surprise. Since 2003 and the arrival of British troops in Basra, UK military and government forces have constantly boasted about the good relations between the British army and the local population. First of all, it should be pointed out that the occupying forces in this mainly anti-Ba'athist, shia region have had a far easier task than those deployed in sunni or mixed areas. However, the main reason the British forces did not come under attack so often was because they tolerated the excesses of all the shia militias - from Daawa to the Council for Islamic Revolution, to even Moqtada al Sadr supporters.

As these militias attacked any trace of secular life in this port city with a tradition of tolerance, the British army pretended nothing was happening. As early as the summer of 2003, shops selling alcoholic drinks (mainly owned by christians) were ransacked and set on fire, while the British army was keeping out of the way. In 2003 and 2004 girl students who refused to wear the islamic hijab were attacked and thrown out of university campuses, while British troops were busy looking after visiting ministers and other dignitaries.

By 2005 the shia militias had been strengthened by the 'democratic' elections that had put Hezb al-Daawa (prime minister Ibrahim Jaafari's party) and the Council for Islamic Revolution (its shia coalition partner, led by Abdul Aziz Al-Hakim) in power in Baghdad and felt able to go even further in their crusade against secular forces. In March last year shia militias attacked what they called an 'immoral picnic' by Basra university students. The students had begun to lay out their picnic in the spring sunshine when dozens of men armed with guns poured into the park, and started shouting at students that they were immoral, that meeting boys and girls together and playing music was against islam. They began shooting into the air and then beat up the students with their sticks and rifle butts. Two students are believed to have been killed.

Throughout this incident the British army never left the barracks. No militia man was arrested, while the local police, trained and installed by the British, refused to assist those students who were running from the scene seeking protection.

In May 2005 news agencies reported that assassins known to be associated with shia militias had murdered more than 100 sunnis - their bodies were left on street corners, shot in the head, hands bound. Over the last three years, as Basra and the southern provinces became a 'Shiastan', as pro-Iran militias increased their power inside and outside the local police and army, the British army has lost control to such an extent that today it is mainly confined to barracks.

On the propaganda front, British security services and 'intelligence' officers are busy in the southern provinces, reminding some of the shia groups and their militia of past UK assistance and trying to deter further rapprochement with Iran. A high-ranking Hezb al-Daawa member in Basra claims that in January he was called in by the 'British section of the Daawa party' to be reminded that it was the UK that helped him during his exile and that he should keep away from 'the Iranians'. It seems there are new divisions opening up amongst the shia factions.

As always, all this is not unrelated to US-UK relations with Iran at a time when threats against it are escalating. The Iranian regime claims that unrest in its southern province, Khouzestan - which is situated near Basra, just across the Shat-ol-Arab waters - is being fermented by UK troops and some commentators, including John Pilger, have picked up on this story. No-one knows who is behind a wave of bombing that has hit Ahvaz, Khouzestan's provincial capital. However, most Iranians - Arab and non-Arab - blame Iran's islamic regime, as the bombings have given it the best excuse to arrest opponents in this province (including many anti-war, leftwing Arab and Persian workers), accusing them of being British spies!

Quite clearly the southern province of Iraq will be the scene of further skirmishes, threats and accusations from both the occupation forces and pro-Iran militias and, as always, the people of Basra province and Khouzestan will be the main victims of these events.

However, a hopeful sign on both sides of the border is the increasing role of workers in economic and political events. In Basra province the oilworkers' fight against privatisation will bring them into conflict not only with the occupation forces, but also the shia political parties that are in favour of neoliberal capital.

The unprecedented escalation of workers' struggles in Iran, often against privatisation and job losses, stands as a reminder of the historic strike of Khouzestan's own oilworkers in 1979 - a strike that played a crucial role in the overthrow of the shah's regime. Although much of Iran's current oil and gas reserves is now found in central, western and northern parts of the country, which means that Khouzestan province is no longer the oil region of Iran, Arab and Farsi-speaking oilworkers in this province remain amongst the most radical sections of the working class.

In southern Iran and southern Iraq the only forces that can simultaneously fight occupation, imperialism and capitalism are the workers - in particular the oilworkers. Anti-war support and solidarity should go to them and only to them. Neither the shia militias, with their murderous record, nor the Iranian state can or will save the people of the region from occupation, war and poverty.