Workers' Struggles

This is the text of a leaflet, issued by the comrades of the IMT in Peru on 4 January, when there was a call for an indefinite general strike in the southern regions of the country, as part of the struggle to oppose the coup against President Castillo.

Barely a month after the CCP’s pompous 20th Party Congress, anger from below is bursting to the surface. Last week, the Foxconn mega-factory in Zhengzhou, Henan saw a violent confrontation between workers and the police over wage theft by management, and in the past two days, large and violent protests have been reported in many major cities, targeting the regime’s draconian lockdown measures, which have become a focal point for widespread discontent. As we have long predicted, the deep crisis of Chinese capitalism is beginning to spur the masses into action.

The Spanish Marxists of Lucha de Clases visited workers of the Canadian multinational company Linamar, in the factory in Vitoria-Gasteiz. They are on all-out strike in the face of the employer's threat to freeze their wages and worsen their working conditions. The following is a report of this exemplary struggle.

Since last week, spontaneous protests have been breaking out in Iran following cuts to subsidies on basic foodstuffs, combined with spiralling inflation. Prices for staples like cooking oil, chicken, milk and eggs have abruptly raised by as much as 300 percent. In past weeks, the price of a kilogram of flour has increased by 500 percent. Subsidy cuts have also caused a 169 percent surge in the price of pasta. This is creating a desperate situation for the masses, provoking a backlash that is combining with workers’ struggles, resulting in an explosive mix.

A wave of unionization in the United States is enthusing and inspiring workers all around the world. The first Amazon warehouse in Staten Island, New York, is now represented by the independent Amazon Labor Union. Every week, dozens of Starbucks coffee shops are filling to join Starbucks Workers United. A first group of workers at an Apple Store signed their cards to join the Communication Workers of America. There have been ...

On Wednesday 6 April, hundreds of thousands of workers from all over Greece responded to the call of the General Confederation of Greek Workers (GSEE) and the Civil Servants' Confederation (ADEDY) to join a 24-hour general strike. Tens of thousands of workers, along with unemployed citizens and youth, participated in strike rallies organised in over 70 cities.

Workers at the Greek rail company TRAINOSE in Thessaloniki have forced the bosses to back down, after refusing to assist with transporting NATO tanks from the port of Alexandroupoli to Ukraine. The following statement was originally written in Greek on 5 April 2022, prior to the general strike that commenced the following day.

Early on the morning of April 1, a historic victory for the American working class was won. Amazon, the second-largest employer in the US, owned by the second-richest person, and a bastion of anti-union resistance by the bosses, has been dealt a serious blow. The JFK8 fulfillment center in Staten Island, New York has become the first Amazon facility in the US to be officially unionized, after a majority of 2,654 to 2,131 voted to organize with the upstart Amazon Labor Union (ALU). A simultaneous vote is still underway in Bessemer, Alabama. This is taking place at the same time as a ...

Today and tomorrow, workers across India will take part in a general strike, which the trade union leaders anticipate could involve over 200 million people. Demands include improved conditions and wages for workers, farmers and the poor; universal social security cover for informal workers; a halt to privatisations; and the scrapping of reactionary new labour laws.

Last week, P&O Ferries sacked hundreds of workers, replacing them with agency labour. With this savage attack, the bosses have declared war on the whole working class. The trade unions must respond with a call to arms – and prepare for battle.

The workers of Turkey are beginning to make the ruling class tremble. A strike wave is rapidly spreading across the country. Beginning among some of the most precariously employed workers, it has spread from factory to factory. From 6 January to 14 February, there have been 65 strikes across Turkey, with new strikes erupting every day. As the strike wave has progressed, it has threatened to draw in the heavy battalions of the working class, and has already brought in workers from Erdoğan’s own heartland.

The whole of Poland is paying attention to the strike of workers at the Solaris bus factory in Bolechowo, near Poznań. Additionally, in Białystok, workers at the Bison Company have begun a rolling strike; while workers at Pudliszki (a food-processing brand owned by the multinational Kraft Heinz) also issued a strike warning. Deteriorating living conditions are paving the way for the resurgence of the organised working-class movement in the country.

In the past month, there have been over 230 strikes and protests across Iran. Since their national three-day strike from 10–13 December, teachers’ protests, led by a Teachers’ Coordinating Council, have continued across Iran. Sporadic strikes continue among oil workers in Khuzestan, and on a nearly daily basis, there are reports of workers at major factories spontaneously launching indefinite strike action.

This month has seen a relentless series of over 230 strikes and protests in Iran. The most prominent of these was a two-day teachers’ strike on 11-13 December, involving tens of thousands of teachers in hundreds of cities across the country. The regime responded by arresting over 200 teachers and trade unionists.

The Cadiz metalworkers are waging a magnificent battle in defence of the purchasing power of their wages, serving as a beacon of inspiration to all the workers of Spain. Faced with the greed of the bosses, the police repression and the attacks of the prostituted press, the workers are determined to fight to the end.

The Sudanese Revolution has taken a new turn. 28 days after the coup that removed him from power, Abdalla Hamdok was reinstated as Prime Minister by the military junta. The streets, which have fought and shed blood for a month to win civilian rule, have met this news, not with jubilation – but rage.

This week saw the conclusion of a month-long strike involving over 10,000 United Auto Workers (UAW) workers at John Deere, the world’s largest farming equipment manufacturer. Workers at 14 facilities in five US states returned to work on Wednesday having approved a contract that guarantees them an immediate 10 percent wage rise, improved retirement benefits and an $8,500 signing bonus.