Workers at the Sarcheshmeh copper production facility in Rafsanjan have begun a protest after the executive director of the company was removed in Kerman Province.
The Eco Fars website reports that employees of Sarcheshmeh copper production have staged several recent demonstrations to protest the removal of Ardeshir Saadmohammadi and to call for his return to the position of executive director of National Copper Industries of Iran.
The workers have threatened to halt production if the former executive director of Saipa, Iran’s top car-manufacturing company, takes over the highest position at the National Copper Industries of Iran.
The Fars News Agency reports that the Rafsanjan and Anar representative in Parliament, Hossein Azin, has protested the move, saying: “Such a change in the copper industry is not in the interests of the people in the region or even the national copper industry.”
The former executive director of Saipa is reportedly close to the president’s chief adviser, Esfandiar Rahim Mashai, and rumours of his appointment to the top position in the copper industry have been challenged by 10 parliamentary representatives, who have written to the Industry, Commerce and Mining minister.
With an estimated billion tons of copper, Sarcheshmeh Mine is the largest discovered copper mine in the world.
