Sun 14 June 2020:
The authorities of the Islamic Republic have dismissed any accusation of negligence in the case of a young oil worker who recently committed suicide, reportedly being desperate for not receiving his unpaid wages.
Emran Roshani-Moghadam hanged himself on Wednesday in the oil-rich Khuzestan Province after his repeated appeals to the contractor to pay his overdue wages failed, his coworkers said.
In an interview with the monopolized state-run TV on Friday, June 12, an oil ministry official expressed regret about the young worker’s fate but rejected that he committed suicide for not receiving his wages. The official also insisted that there has been no “negligence” on the contractor’s part, and he has fulfilled all his obligations.
The official, Touraj Dehqani, referred to the young worker as an employee of small contractor of the Oil Ministry, reiterating that it was not true that the young worker committed suicide for not being paid.
The contractor also claimed in a statement that the worker’s salary was late for only six days.
Furthermore, the contractor has implicitly accused the worker of being a drug addict, claiming that he was in a rehabilitation clinic for 21 days.
However, according to media and social media reports Roshani-Moqaddam who worked as a security guard at F19 oil well of the Yadavaran oil field hanged himself at the site of the oil well after making a call to the contractor and saying he was destitute and couldn’t feed his family anymore.
A colleague of the young man was quoted by Iran Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) as saying that the contractor had not paid his meager monthly wages for two months and when he called them they said they could not pay him. After the call, the worker went to the oil well and hanged himself.
In the meantime, oil minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh has asked an official to travel to the region and follow-up the case.
The difficult economic situation and widespread corruption have caused dissatisfaction among ordinary Iranians and there are several reports about suicide in different regions of the country.
In recent days, at least two other suicides have been on top of the news. A disabled war veteran, Jahangir Azadi, set himself on fire on June 7 in the city of Kermanshah, western Iran, and died hours later in the hospital. His request for a $550 loan was rejected by the veterans’ foundation.
Jahangir Azadi had a wife and three children, and it is said that he had applied for an eighty million rials (about $550) loan.
radiofarda
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