LAST THURSDAY 21 Iranian students were finally freed on £500 bail each after having been held in Brixton prison for nine days. The 21 had been arrested by a squad of armed police after a brief and completely peaceful sit-in at the Iranian Embassy on 29 April, in protest at the recent brutal murder SUBSCRIPTION RATES: DOMESTIC: £6 per year FOREIGN:
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•AMOUNT ENCLOSED....... 'conspiracy to trespass.
a long string of attacks on democratic rights in this country. For a long time now the ruling class and their state have been whipping up a big scare campaign over terrorism to justify beefing up the power of the police. The joint army-police manoeuvres at Heathrow and the creation of armed for the killing of two unarmed protesters at the Indian Embassy last year have been the more obvious aspects of this campaign.
out the arrests in this case, where the demonstrators were clearly peaceful, shows that the police no longer feel they need any sort of pretext before using these squads. It is just a first step towards a mo.e widespread use of armed police to intimidate leftwing demonstrators.
the hard way through the Shrewsbury the conspiracy laws are in the hands of the ruling class. The outcry over the Shrewsbury case may make the state think twice about using these laws against trade unionists in the lash out with this legal weapon wherever they think they can get away with it.
The failure of the labour move: ment to respond to the attack on democratic rights involved in the Prevention of Terrorism Act has given the state forces the impression that they can get away with selective crackdowns on minority groups like Irish Republicans and the far left. The attack on the 21 is clearly in this mould. But the labour movement should be under no illusion-whether it is Irish Republicans or Iranian ping block today, it will be trade unionists whom the state is atter tomorrow.
shows up one of the most dangerous sides of the conspiracy laws. In Bri tain it is not a crime to trespass just an unlawful act for which one could be sued or for which a court could issue a prevention order.
This move represents the latest in police squads (such as that responsible The use of armed police to carry The labour movement has learnt case what a powertul political weapon immediate future; but the Iranian case shows that they are as eager as ever to damage. students whose heads are on the chopThe 'conspiracy to trespass' charge of nine oppositionists by the Iranian dictatorship. For this crime' the 21 are being charged with Ever since the late 1960s reactionaries have been calling for a law that would make trespass illegal so that it could be used against student occupations, squatters, etc. However to pass such a law would require an open debate in Parliament, making it an issue of political debate in the workers movement and allowing those Chris Balfour who opposed it to organise to prevent it being passed. So to avoid this, the House of Lords waved the magic wand of the conspiracy laws two years at the hands of the Iranian dictator ago and created the crime of conspiracy to trespass' out of thin air (despite the fact that British courts had ruled for over a century and a half that no such offence existed!)
This law could easily be used to crack down on the student and squatting movements. At the moment its use against the labour movement is prevented by another law which rules out the use of this particular sort of conspiracy charge against an 'industrial dispute'. But all it would need is a reactionary judge to rule that a Another group of Embassy-occupiers ha: recently been convicted of conspiracy to trespass. They had barricaded themserves in an embassy and done extensive But no armed police were deemed necessary to secure their arrest. They were only neid overnigat, and then prompuy released on tzo ball. Arte conviction they received a polite warning from the judge who complimented them on their idealism) and allowed to go free with six months suspended sentences. Ine reason is simple-une were reactionary Ukrainians who had occupied the Soviet Embassy.
Of course the courts will try to deny that the trial of the 21 Iranians is a polia case buame conrast perween their treatment and that of the Ukrain ians has already exposed this hypocrisy. There is no doubt that the courts will continue to mete out this sort of class Justice to the Iranian 21 if the labour movement does not take up their cause given workers' occupation was not an 'industrial dispute' but "politically motivated' (and how many times a week do we hear that in the capitalist press?) and the armed police squads would be swinging into action against trade unionists.
Another serious erosion of democratic rights highlighted by the present case is the shaky legal position in which most immigrants are put under the Immigration Act. If they are convicted, the 21 will all be liable to deportation under the Immigration Act-to face certain imprisonment and brutalisation and possible death ship. All because they staged a peaceful protest demonstration!
It is no accident that the Iranian dictatorship should have found such a concerned champion in the British state at the present time. The increase in world oil prices has given Iran a more important role in the world imperialist system. Iranian loans are important to prop up the tottering pound, and Iranian orders help keep the crumbling British car industry (é.g. Chrysler) afloat.
Meanwhile Iran is negotiating to buy a slice in BP and other capitalist firms in this country, and the Iranian army is taking over from Britain the job of crushing any new uprising by the impoverished masses in the area of the Persian Gulf. The Labour Government, committed as it is to this imperialist system, is cutting its cloth to fit the new situation, and quite happily doing the Shah's dirty work for him by attacking his political opponents in this country.
Both the defence of democratic rights in this country and the fight against imperialism and reaction internationally require the most intransigent defence of the 21. The student and labour movement must immediately take up this case and demand that the Labour Government promptly gets all charges against the 21 dropped and stops its policy of collaborating with the rotten Iranian dictatorship. We must further insist that Labour stops cooperating in the strengthening of the repressive capitalist state machine; it must disband all armed police units and promptly abolish the conspiracy laws
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... but on the other hand