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| Arabia |
| Six Students Wounded as Sanaa University Reopens |
| 2011-09-18 |
| [An Nahar] Six students were maimed in festivities Saturday on the first day of the academic year between rival groups at Sanaa University, near the epicenter of ongoing protests, a hospital source said. Two groups, divided between students who backed a resumption of classes and those who did not, came to blows, with stones and other projectiles also being used in the festivities, according to those involved and the medical official. Shouting "No lessons, no teaching, before the ouster of the president (President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh ... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower... )," hundreds of students marched through the university grounds, calling for a boycott of classes and trying to keep their classmates from going to their lessons, an Agence La Belle France Presse journalist said. Hassan Kahlani, a teacher at the university, told AFP he had temporarily stopped his students from leaving the lecture hall they were in at the end of their class. Only around 15 percent of students attended their classes on the first day of the academic year at Sanaa University, according to students. Access to the university was controlled by military forces loyal to dissident General Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar, whose troops control Change Square, next to the university and where protesters have since February been calling for the departure of President-for-Life Saleh ... exemplifying the Arab's propensity to combine brutality with incompetence... Tanks and armored vehicles were stationed at the entrance to the campus and armed civilians were also seen along the walls of the university, while the departments of arts and languages remained closed, students said. Minister of Higher Education Saleh Ba-Sourah said he had met with General al-Ahmar on Saturday, and had asked him "not to involve students in the political crisis". "If we continue to bar students from accessing lecture theatres, the state will have to close the university completely," the minister told AFP. "And the students will be the big losers." Despite large protests that have been ongoing since January against his regime, Saleh has refused to give up power. He has been in Riyadh for the past three months, receiving treatment after being maimed in an attack. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #1 I know that registering for classes can be rough, but... |
| Posted by: Pappy 2011-09-18 14:21 |