Iran's "WWII compensation commission" meets in Tehran

A task force assigned by Iran's president has begun their work in estimating the amount of damage inflicted on the Iranian nation during the Second World War.

The compensation commission, consisting of representatives from Iran's main ministries and organizations, concluded their first meeting on the task in Tehran Saturday.

Earlier this month, President Ahmadinejad had called for the need to demand reparations from the West for the damages inflicted on Iran during the world war that raged between 1939 and 1945.

At the outbreak of the conflict, Iran, which had declared its neutrality, was simultaneously invaded by Britain and the Soviet Union on August 26, 1941.

Iran served as a source of oil and a transit route for American war materials to the Soviet Union -- what the Allies came to call their "victory bridge" or the "Persian Corridor," as it was known.

Britain, the Soviet Union, and the United States together managed to move over 5 million tons of munitions and other war materials across Iran to the Soviet Union.

The war had dire consequences for the ordinary citizens of Iran.

Thousands of Iranian civilians, from laborers and drivers to skilled mechanics, were forced to work the "little Detroit's" truck assembly plants at Iran's northern city of Andimeshk. In one year, 648,000 vehicles were built in Iran for shipment to the Soviet Union.

Severe inflation imposed great hardship on the lower and middle classes, while fortunes were made by individuals dealing in scarce items.

The country's population also suffered food shortages, as the invading forces had bought up most of the grain intended for the Iranian marketplace.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=116376§ionid=351020101.