In Iran, a crackdown on nurses who’ve been staging unprecedented peaceable protests over poor working situations over the previous month has raised new issues from the United States and the Global Federation of Nurses’ Associations.
In certainly one of two statements despatched completely to VOA on Thursday, a State Department official mentioned the Biden administration is “intently monitoring the protests by nurses and different well being care staff in Iran and is worried by studies that many peaceable protesters are being unjustly arrested and punished.”
A U.S. official mentioned the report was [Iranian] The regime’s brutal historical past of suppressing peaceable protests, together with the continued software of harsh legal penalties to those that took half within the 2022 Women, Life and Liberty protests.
In a separate assertion, Howard Catton, CEO of the International Council of Nurses (ICN), mentioned the Geneva-based organisation was “gravely involved by studies from Iran of nurses being harmed while participating in peaceable protests”.
Catton mentioned the federation is in touch with its Iranian member, the National Iranian Nurses Association, and different nurses’ organizations within the nation in an effort to lift issues in regards to the nursing scarcity and low wages. “It’s clear from all of the studies we’re receiving that defending nurses’ rights and affected person security is paramount,” she mentioned.
Protests in 21 cities
According to a Telegram publish by the Free Union of Iranian Workers, a labor union that Iran’s Islamic regime refuses to acknowledge, Iranian nurses started placing at Imam Ali Hospital within the northern metropolis of Karaj on July 31. Since then, the VOA Persian Service has monitored credible studies of peaceable nurse strikes and protests spreading to a minimum of 50 public hospitals in 21 cities throughout Iran.
The head of the Iranian Nurses Association, a state-sanctioned labor union, mentioned in an August 21 interview with state information company Khabar Online that that is the primary time within the 100-year historical past of contemporary nursing in Iran that nurses have protested with a strike.
“The nurses know that in the event that they strike they threat being fired. It has grow to be a scenario the place it would not matter to them whether or not they are going to be fired in the event that they strike,” mentioned Mohammad Sharifi Moghadam, secretary common of the union.
Iranian Health Minister Mohammad Reza Zafargandi, who was sworn in final week as a part of newly put in President Massoud Pezechkian’s cupboard, mentioned the federal government transferred funds to the University of Medical Sciences “for the primary time” earlier this week in response to the nurses’ calls for, state media reported. The state media report didn’t present additional particulars.
State media additionally quoted Zafargandi as promising to fulfill nurses’ monetary expectations “to one of the best of the nation’s capabilities”. Iranian authorities have made comparable guarantees lately to different union protests, however a lot of them have gone unfulfilled.
On Tuesday, in probably the most violent day of protests up to now, VOA Persian obtained credible studies and social media photos of nurses placing in 9 Iranian cities: Bandar Abbas, Bushehr, Hamedan, Ilam, Isfahan, Kermanshah, Nishapur, Tehran and Yazd.
VOA is banned from reporting inside Iran and can’t independently confirm its studies.
Videos posted on social media on Tuesday confirmed Iranian safety forces shoving and detaining a number of medical staff on the protests in Bushehr, whereas one other video confirmed a heavy safety presence at a nurses’ protest in Tehran.
Nurse arrested
International human rights teams have reported a number of arbitrary arrests of nurses in Iran in latest weeks in reference to the protests.
A notable distinction from the “Women, Life and Freedom” protests is that the nurses weren’t seen shouting slogans calling for the downfall of the Islamic Republic. “These nurses have been very smart and cautious in making it clear of their protests and social media content material that their motion just isn’t political in any respect, it’s only about their civil rights,” she mentioned.
“We urge the Iranian regime to acknowledge the necessary function that peaceable protests, together with organized labor actions, play in representing the issues of peculiar staff,” a State Department official mentioned in a press release to VOA.
“I wish to thank all concerned events,” mentioned ICN’s Catton. [in Iran] We will start discussions collectively and negotiate a mutually helpful settlement.”
“Our message is, first, solidarity with all nurses in Iran,” Catton mentioned. “Second, [it is] We name on all these in energy to do all they will to make sure nurses are correctly protected and supported, together with with adequate assets and funding to ship secure, high-quality affected person care.”
Motalebi mentioned the nurses appeared to keep up broad public assist in Iran by guaranteeing emergency medical amenities maintained minimal staffing ranges whereas they have been on strike. “They did this to make sure that the well being of the group was not adversely affected,” he mentioned.
Mohammed Kazem Atari, a doctor-trained at Tehran University and a U.S.-based activist for social justice in well being care, mentioned in a message to VOA that almost all Iranians sympathize with the nurses as a result of they perceive it’s a protest towards insupportable situations that put the lives of each nurses and sufferers in danger.
“The public is starting to understand that nurses’ calls for for higher working situations and truthful wages are important not just for the nurses themselves, but additionally for the standard of healthcare for all Iranians,” Atari mentioned.
VOA’s Persian Language Service contributed to this report.