NCRI – Shopkeepers ignored Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's promise to postpone the imposed value added tax and kept their business closed on Sunday. Tehran bazaar is a major economic barometer of the regime's worsening crisis.
NCRI – Shopkeepers ignored Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's promise to postpone the imposed value added tax and kept their business closed on Sunday. Tehran bazaar is a major economic barometer of the regime's worsening crisis.
The State Security Forces (SSF) – mullahs' suppressive police—and the plain-cloths agents of the notorious Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) presence was clear in trying to force the shops to stay open.
One of the shopkeepers told AFP,"Because of this tax (VAT), there is an increase of 10 to 15 percent in prices, so we want the government to annul the law."
"By closing our shops we are losing money for a few days but if we do not succeed we will lose money for ever," another bazaari said.
"I hope the bazaaris win and not the government, since I would be purchasing things more expensively because of the new tax," said a dissatisfied consumer.
A state-run morning daily Hamshahri further infuriated the bazaaris calling them "thugs and hooligans."
"They are a punch of 'thugs' and not bazaaris. They are some middle men working in bazaar who sparked the unrest," Hamshahri wrote on Sunday.
Merchants went on strike over value added tax (VAT) regulations imposed by the mullahs' regime in Tehran, central city of Isfahan, southern city of Shiraz, holy city of Mashhad and Qazvin, some 170 km northwest of the capital.
On Tuesday, the fourth day of the strikes, more than 3,000 protesting shopkeepers closed down their businesses and marched to the governor's office in Isfahan.
The merchants demonstrated in Enqelab Square, Char-Baqe Abassi, Isfahan's main bazaar as well as Bahonar, Hendiha, Alameh, Masjed-Jame, Sabzeh-Meidan, Sepah and Qeysarieh bazaars as well as home appliances of Moshir Square, reported the state-run media.
Merchants of major cities such as Mashhad, Shiraz, Qazvin, Tehran and the northern city of Tabriz protested to the rule and the law barring them from "blocking the walkways outside shops."
The State Security Forces – suppressive mullahs' police — attacked the shopkeepers attempting to break up their strike in Qazvin.
