Iran: Major Strike Of Kerman Mine Workers

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Published: Wednesday, 30 November -0001 01:00

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According to the Iranian Labor News Agency (ILNA), on Monday, April 22, 2020, 3,000 workers oF the tunnels of Kerman Coal Company in Ravar, Kuhbanan and Zarand TOWNSHIPS stopped working and In protest of the transfer of Kerman Coal Company gathered in front of the office of the county’s authority. This is the largest labor strike and protest this year.

The workers demand to implement the job classification scheme, apply the retirement job coefficient in hard and harmful jobs, implement the overtime law, increase wages in accordance with the type of job and the level of job hardship and apply annual increases for workers in Kermanshah coal mines. In 2010, the efforts of the workers of the Kerman Coal Company paid off and the company was taken out of the hands of the private contractors and placed under the control of the government, but in 2013, when Rouhani's government took office due to the clearing of previous government debts, Kerman's coal was handed over to the Steel Pension Fund Company, which is a private fund created by the Isfahan Iron Smelter, which is created to pay pensions. Now, again Kerman's coal is to be handed over to a private company called Dalahoo. Workers fear that their labor force will once again be taken over by contractors and that they will become "hired" workers; on the other hand, the private sector will gradually sell the company's backing lands in order to make a profit.
In a letter to Ravar township officials, the protesting workers expressed their demands as follows:
1 - Converting the status of the workers' contract from doing a certain job to a permanent contract.
2 - Payment of insurance premiums and wages for March 2020 workers due to Corona virus.
3 - Proper, complete and flawless implementation of job classification plan.
4 - Retirement coefficient in hard and harmful jobs according to the steel employment law in the years 1990 – 2000 with the implementation of 15 years of experience in coal mining.
5 - Implementation of the provisions of the Labor Law, especially overtime, implementation of Article 92 and job security of Article 7 of the Labor Law and Regulations of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
6 - Increasing the fixed wage of the labor office compared to other jobs and annual increases for the workers of the coal mines of the whole province. Despite the pandemic of corona virus in Iran, workers were employed in many Iranian mines, including the Kerman coal. It is unknown at this time that how many works have been infected with coved 19.