A busy six months - and an appeal for help

[Omaha Steve]

Six months ago, on May Day, I wrote to you to ask for your support to help keep LabourStart going -- and growing.

And since then, we've been busier than ever.

In July, we held our first-ever Global Solidarity Conference in Canada, attracting trade union activists from around the globe.

In August we re-launched UnionBook, the social networking site for trade unionists.

In the next few days we're going to launch editions of LabourStart in Tamil, Georgian,Ukrainian and Serbian. (In addition to the more than two dozen languages we already appear in.)

And we've been doing online campaigns - lots of them.

Here are some of the highlights:

* Iran - execution of teacher trade unionist Farzad Kamangar
* Vietnam - jailing of three young labour activists for leading a strike
* China - protest worker suicides at Foxconn plant
* Colombia - demand freedom for jailed teacher unionist
* Algeria - protest closure of trade union headquarters
* Turkey - support workers at UPS suffering from union-busting
* India - protest mass arrests at Foxconn factory

To continue with this work, to expand it, to become more effective, we need more resources.

I need you to dig deep into your pocket to make a generous donation to LabourStart.

A donation of US$25.00 or more would help a great deal.

Please do so today by clicking on this link:

http://www.labourstart.org/donate.shtml

And please make sure to encourage your union to make a substantial donation as well.

I know that I can count on your help.

Thanks.

Eric Lee

[leveymg]

1. Farzad Kamangar was executed for his involvement in a separatist group that blew up a gas pipeline

His being a teacher trade unionist had nothing to do with it. This from Reuters, reposted at PBS: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/2010/05/selected-headlines-172.html.

Iran hangs five members of Kurdish 'terrorist' group

Reuters | May 9, 2010

Iran hanged five members of a Kurdish "anti-revolutionary" group for various charges, including "moharebe" or waging war against God, the official IRNA news agency reported Sunday.

Farzad Kamangar, Ali Haydarian, Farhad Vakili, Shirin Alam- Houli and Mehdi Eslamian were members of the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK), an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) which took up arms in 1984 for an ethnic homeland in southeast Turkey and northwest Iran.

"The five, including one woman, were hanged inside Tehran's Evin prison Sunday morning ... They confessed carrying out deadly terrorist operations in the country in the past years," IRNA said.

Iran sees PJAK, which seeks autonomy for Kurdish areas in Iran and shelters in Iraq's northeastern border provinces, as a terrorist group.

In recent years, Iranian forces have often clashed with PJAK guerrillas, who operate out of bases in northern Iraq. Kurds are large minorities in Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria.

The five Kurdish activists were convicted in 2008. They were hanged after a Supreme Court upheld their death sentences.