Founded 2007 Location London, United Kingdom | Type Interest group Area served Worldwide | |
Focus Anti-war, Peace, Secularism, Anti-clericalism, Anti-imperialism, Anti-capitalism, Social equality Key people Yassamine Mather (Chair)
Mark Fischer (Secretary)
Moshé Machover | ||
Hands Off the People of Iran (HOPI) is a leftist anti-war group led mostly by exiled Iranian and British socialists, based in the United Kingdom. It is opposed to Western military intervention in Iran, which it considers imperialist. It also criticises the government of Iran, while advocating radical anti-government secularist groups in that country. The organisation's chair is Iranian exile Yassamine Mather of the Centre for the Study of Socialist Theory and Movements at the University of Glasgow.
Contents
Formation
The initiative for Hands Off the People of Iran came from a number of Iranian exile organisations in 2005. On March 16, 2006, Workers Left Unity - Iran wrote an open letter to the British anti-war movement, calling for genuine solidarity with the Iranian people. By 2007 HOPI was fully established, consisting predominantly of Iranian exiles who campaign for regime change in Iran but are against external military intervention, believing military occupation to be the worst condition under which liberation can be achieved. HOPI's founding conference was held in December 2007.
At the Founding Conference, a National Steering Committee was established consisting of seventeen members from a range of different political organisations and political traditions. These include members of the Green Party of England and Wales, Labour Representation Committee, Jewish Socialist Group, Permanent Revolution, Centre for the Study of Socialist Theory and Movements at the University of Glasgow, Communist Party of Great Britain (Provisional Central Committee), Workers Left Unity - Iran, Revolutionary Workers of Iran, Anarchist Federation (pc) and Women’s Campaign Against All Misogynist Laws in Iran.
An Irish branch of HOPI, chaired by Anne McShane, organised a protest outside the Iranian Embassy in Dublin in June 2009.
Expulsion from Stop the War Coalition
Shortly before Stop the War Coalition's 2007 AGM, HOPI, alongside another organisation Communist Students, was denied affiliation with the Coalition.
Affiliates and Supporters
Prominent affiliates or supporters of HOPI include the Public and Commercial Services Union; ASLEF, the train drivers' union and Peter Tatchell,.