Members of the CPUSA Labor Commission and delegates from the Hello Comrade project hold up a flag of the World Federation of Trade Unions outside the headquarters of PEO in Nicosia, Cyprus. | Photo via Cameron Harrison / People’s World
NICOSIA, Cyprus—The struggle for political and economic democracy by the U.S. working class has long been fractured into groups each fighting seemingly isolated battles: labor resists union-busting, women’s organizations struggle against attacks on abortion rights, peace activists target the hoarding of wealth for war and corporate profit, and, as Los Angeles has shown as of late, immigrants and the working poor face off against White House-led ICE raids.
But over the past few years—particularly after the return of Trump to the presidency in 2025—these movements have begun to converge. Regular and sweeping cross-union strike lines, targeted and highly effective boycotts amid corporate rollbacks on DEI initiatives, and national mobilizations against ICE demonstrate that bigger and bigger sections of the working class are recognizing their shared enemy.
Young U.S. trade unionists meet with World Federation of Trade Unions General Secretary Pambis Kyritsis, second from left, in Nicosia, Cyprus. | Photo via Cameron Harrison / People’s World
It’s sometimes difficult to pause and look beyond immediate fights, but doing so is essential. It’s not just our own past battles that can prove educational, though. It’s also important to learn from international comrades, too. In Cyprus, the Progressive Party of Working People (AKEL) and its labor movement partner, the Pancyprian Federation of Labor (PEO), offer a decades-long example of how unified, uncompromising struggle can prevail against colonialism, capitalism, and manufactured division.
Members of the Communist Party USA’s Labor Commission and the party’s Hello Comrade program recently visited Cyprus and met with PEO leaders to discuss shared struggles against exploitation, oppression, and militarism. Additionally, young U.S. trade unionists held a special meeting with World Federation of Trade Unions General Secretary Pambis Kyritsis, exchanging analyses on the global situation and making significant progress toward future cooperation between the WFTU and progressive U.S. unions.
Cyprus’ labor movement began under British colonial rule, with socialists pioneering the first labor unions in the 1910s and ’20s—before the right to unionize was even codified into law. By the late 1930s, over 40 labor unions converged into the Pancyprian Trade Union Committee (PSE) in 1941, a landmark display of revolutionary solidarity between Greek and Turkish Cypriots, who were often pitted against each other by employers.
When authorities banned legally registered socialist unions and arrested their leaders in 1945, workers responded by forming PEO the following year. Its members continue this legacy of revolutionary labor organizing today.
One of PEO’s most significant actions was the 1948 miners’ and construction workers’ strike, which lasted nearly a year and saw Greek and Turkish Cypriots uniting against a U.S.-owned mining company. When management retaliated by cutting off the daily milk ration for workers’ children, communities rallied with donations of milk, food, and other essentials. The strike’s breakthrough victories became historic proof that collective action could overcome anti-communist colonial oppression.
PEO and AKEL have long struggled to preserve and strengthen solidarity between Greek and Turkish Cypriots, even after the 1974 Turkish invasion divided the island and entrenched military occupation over a large portion of its territory.
Today, Cyprus’s service economy presents new challenges for PEO’s organizing efforts. Domestic care workers—primarily migrants—earn under €400 per week while employers illegally withhold their passports, creating a perilous situation for those seeking justice against super-exploitation.
Outside PEO headquarters in Nicosia, Cyprus. | Photo via Cameron Harrison / People’s World
The Pancyprian Federation of Services’ Workers (PASEY-PEO) has prioritized organizing these workers, reinforcing the principle that migrants’ rights are labor rights—and working-class rights. Young workers in Cyprus face struggles mirroring those in the U.S., from stagnant wages and unaffordable housing to unsafe conditions and attacks on cost-of-living adjustments. Yet they are organizing across sectors to resist.
What distinguishes PEO—and the broader Cypriot struggle—is its refusal to separate and isolate the common fights. Despite efforts by Cyprus’s conservative government and employers to divide workers in the decades since Turkey’s occupation, PEO continues organizing Greek and Turkish Cypriots in unity.
In addition to fighting for immigrant workers, the PEO finds other ways to link up domestic and global issues. As Cyprus’s land is used as a launchpad for war and genocide in the Middle East, for instance, PEO demands the removal of British military bases while standing firmly for Palestinian liberation.
These lessons resonate in the U.S., where the working class is resisting escalating repression and attacks on trade union freedoms. Just as Cypriot workers have shown that solidarity transcends imposed divisions, coordinated actions by U.S. unions and communities have forced ICE to retreat from planned raids, and many unions have taken up the cause of Palestinian solidarity.
After the meeting of Cypriot and U.S. young workers in Nicosia, the path forward for the whole of the working class was clearly illuminated for those in attendance. Only through unified, internationalist struggle can the labor movement dismantle the capitalist system that exploits and divides us and build a future rooted in justice and collective power.
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