Capitalism is the biggest danger that threatens the earth. Over the last two centuries the distinguishing feature of capitalism has been war, terror, execution, torture, dictatorship, ignorance, national, ethnic and religious conflicts, poverty and unemployment, depression and suicide, discrimination and inequality, and all sorts of injustices and discrimination. Capitalism has turned the immense power of human labour and creativity into money and capital, into wealth that is alien to and dominates the human being. It has turned the overwhelming majority of people into wage slaves. Today, however, capitalism and its insatiable appetite for profit and accumulation have driven all these characteristics to the final limit, even threatening the very existence of humanity. The future of life itself now depends on liberation from capitalism. The only force that can rid the earth and its inhabitants of this danger is the unity and worldwide struggle of all wage slaves, the political and economic expropriation of the capitalist class, and restoration of the will of the human being to the human being. May Day, the International Workers’ Day, is a day for the show of our determination and unity, a day for reaffirmation to accomplish this task.

At the same time, May Day is a day for putting forward our specific demands. Reduction in working hours, a traditional demand of May Day, alongside the demand for increase in wages and the fight against austerity, from Iran to Greece, France, the United States and China, are among these demands. The International Workers’ Day is a day in which we must come to the fore against the top 1%, against the banks and parasites, against billionaire Ayatollahs and their governments, and to shout out loud that enough is enough! Unemployment is enough! Poverty is enough! Discrimination and inequality is enough! The immense wealth that humans produce today, if not wasted in wars and the expenditure for armies and police states and in the bank accounts of capitalists, would suffice a thousand times over to eradicate all the problems of humanity.

May Day in Iran is above all a day of protest against the Islamic regime of Iran, the government of billionaire Ayatollahs. It is a day of protest against below-poverty-line wages and the unemployment of millions, and a day to struggle for the right to organise and strike. May Day in Iran is a day to raise the demand for political freedoms, especially the release of political prisoners, including jailed workers’ and teachers’ leaders. May Day is a day to protest against any form of discrimination and inequality, in particular discrimination against women. May Day is a day of unity of all sections of the working class, from workers in production to those in services, the employed and the unemployed, workers on work training and education and retired workers. May Day is a day of unity of humanity in defence of life against the barbarism of capitalism and its Islamic regime.

The Worker-communist Party of Iran welcomes the International Workers’ Day with all its power, and greets all women and men who are working for a magnificent May Day in Iran and around the world.

Long Live May Day, the International Workers’ Day!

Worker-communist Party of Iran

15 April 2016