Iraq: "The bedrock of democracy is a strong labour movement"
Leaders from the three main trade union organisations in Iraq — the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU), the Federation of Workers’ Councils and Unions of Iraq (FWCUI), and the General Union of Oil Employees (GUOE) — toured the USA in June. On 26 June, at the end of the tour, they made a joint statement, together with US Labor Against The War, who organised the tour. What’s in the statement is commonplace. Opposition both to the occupation and to the “terrorists”, support for women’s equality and cancellation of Iraq’s Saddam-era debt, and opposition to privatisation, are all long-standing...