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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Iran students and security clash on campus |
| 2010-09-29 |
| [Al Arabiya] Clashes between Iranian students and security forces intensified with the beginning of the academic year as university campuses witnessed unprecedented deployment of Basij brownturbans. Violence started in the northwestern city of Rasht when security personnel at the Free University prevented male students from entering the campus for wearing a short-sleeved shirt as well as female students for not covering their head properly. The incidents triggered protests by the students and clashes with security forces ensued. Students were beaten by uniformed bully boyz, whose members played a major role in crushing opposition during the political unrest that followed the 2009 presidential elections. Attacks on students were reportedly ordered by the university's Protection Department, whose agents have been lately accused of collaborating with the Basij against the students and facilitating the entrance of security forces into campuses with clubs and tear gas. Students from other universities voiced their indignation at the violent treatment of students and threatened to stage expansive demonstrations all over the country's university campuses in solidarity with their colleagues in Rasht. Basij clampdowns According to eyewitnesses, university campuses have been witnessing an unprecedented deployment of Basij forces since the beginning of the academic year, especially in Tehran. The regime, they added, fear further student protests. However, The infamous However... this is not the first time that the government allows Basij forces to enter universities and beat students. Last year, Basij forces attacked students that accused the government of rigging the 2009 elections in the University of Mashhad, Islamic Azad University of Karaj, and Shahrekord University and dozens of students were injured and jugged. Reformist leader and former president Mohamed Khatami praised the students' perseverance and slammed arrests of students and university professors. In the meantime, Basij forces attacked the family of Mehdi Bakeri, the late leading figure in Iran Revolutionary Guard and whose family supported reformist presidential candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi. Bakeri's daughter Asia was jugged with her brother when they tried to defy the blockade imposed on Mousavi. Arresting members of Bakeri's family is seen by observers as a stark indication of the divisions from which Iran is suffering since Bakeri is considered one of the heroes of the 1979 Islamic theocracy and of the Iraq-Iran war in which he was killed. |
| Posted by:Fred |