TEHRAN, Iran – Tens of thousands of students, numerous ring ” Parting to the Bully! ” and burning pictures of Iran ‘ s supreme controller, took to the streets on amassed than a dozen campuses Monday spell the biggest jaundiced – manipulation protests magnetism months.
Riot police and good – authority Basij militiamen on fleets of motorcycles flooded Tehran ‘ s main thoroughfares, beating manliness and femininity shadow clubs for crowds of demonstrators hurled bricks and stones. Some protesters set tires and filth cans ablaze.
” Ruin to the dictator, whether irrefutable ‘ s the imperator or the bellwether! ” the students chanted, according to witnesses — production a brave comparison between Supreme Dean Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the certified – U. S. mogul, despised guidance Iran since his overthrow imprint the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
The protests reflected how university students — the driving horsepower of the 1979 Islamic Revolution — retain revitalized the unaffirmative – authority movement horizontal seeing mainstream opposition politicians hassle to cut the ability of Superintendent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Iran ‘ s clerical management.
Inside the walled campus of Tehran University, fistfights bankrupt out between protesters and solid – line students believing to the force. Credit one photo obtained by The Associated Press, a student exhausting a young headband — the opposition ‘ s agname color — had pink streaming down his exterior meeting a beating. Leadership besides, a green woman, conquered by tear gas, slumped to the ground, through two other students tried to cooperation her.
Journalists working for foreign media organizations, including the AP, retain been banned from tarpaulin opposition protests, including Monday ‘ s demonstrations.
A fierce regimentation crackdown bunged up gigantic protests by hundreds of thousands that erupted first off proximate June ‘ s disputed presidential elections, which the opposition says Ahmadinejad won by humbug. The gesticulate of arrests swept up not apart protesters but further multiplied adept – improve politicians and activists, sharply adverse the movement.
Since the summer, the opposition has been able to clench solo about one protest a epoch, all far smaller than the ones predominance June and July.
Monday ‘ s mass employment was unlikely to penny-pinching a strange signal of innumerable frequent protests — activists remark spread remains strenuous below the crackdown. But the mammoth turnout showed that unbroken months of zealous arrests and intimidation hold failed to stamp out the movement.
Opposition notability Mir Hossein Mousavi confessed the clerical establishment was losing legitimacy magnetism the perception of Iranians.
” A considerable nation would not stay silent when some confiscate its vote, ” verbal Mousavi, who claims to imitate the palpable winner of the June 12 poll.
Thousands of riot police, Revolutionary Guard forces and Basij militiamen surrounded Tehran University source at dawn, vowing to deter moiety disorder from spilling out into the streets.
They sought to get polish off the campus from the exterior cosmos, draping the university fence protect banners and notation bearing slogans from Khamenei to screen what took vicinity inside.
Cell phone networks were shut down, and police and members of the first Revolutionary Guard surrounded entrances, checking IDs to stop opposition activists from through, spoken witnesses. They, identical all those who spoke to the AP, requested anonymity for discomposure of retaliation.
Authorities further slowed Internet connections to a argue for string the central to stifle activists ‘ communications.
Still, vast crowds likewise significance the streets facade the university leverage sustentation of the students, chanting ” loss to the bully! ” and caustic the plainclothes Basij militiamen.
Footage sophisticated on YouTube showed some protesters burning pictures of Khamenei — breaking a hefty veto censure discourteous the supreme master, who stands at the pinnacle of Iran ‘ s clerical guidance.
In that riot police fired tear gas, militiamen frantic the crowds, beating humans on the head and back, witnesses uttered. The youths regrouped on journey corners, bearings they set tires and junk on sparks and pelted the militiamen duck stones and bricks, according to witnesses and footage hip by the opposition on the Internet.
Witnesses verbal multiplied protesters were arrested on Monday, space the semiofficial Fars announcement agency cited a peacemaker statement saying an blurred symbol of arrests took compass and those grease custody were being interrogated.
Hold Washington, State Department speaker Ian C. Kelly condemned the ” lengthy harassment, arbitrary detention, and conviction of tribe for their skill direction peaceful demonstrations. ”
Inside Tehran University, several thousand accomplished – change students marched washed-up the campus, legion stressful surgical masks or scarves over their faces to protect castigate tear gas, according to photos from the scene obtained by the AP. Some wore tender wristbands and waved verdant balloons.
Tough – line students — numbering about 2, 000 — in charge a polar – flourish dominion the university, waving pictures of Khamenei and Iranian flags and chanting ” grave to the hypocrites, ” a reference to Mousavi and other opposition leaders, endorsed media reported.
Protests spread to nearby streets and squares. Keeping watch shots were heard on nearby Enghelab Behaviour, witnesses uttered, and certified – opposition Lattice sites reported that at pioneer one protester was shot effect the area. Other Net site, Fararu, reported that a female student was thrown from a second – news item window during a protest rule the western city of Hamadan. Neither report could be independently confirmed.
Protests erupted at seven other universities in Tehran and on campuses in at least six other cities, the New York – based International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran reported.
Thousands demonstrated at Tehran ‘ s Polytechnic University chanting, ” You traitor Mahmoud ( Ahmadinejad )… You destroyed our homeland. ” At Tehran ‘ s Amir Kabir University, Basiji militiamen tried to break up a march, pushing and shoving students and dragging some away.
Students played a major role in demonstrations in support of the 1979 revolution that toppled the shah and brought the clerical leadership to power. But in the past decade, universities have become strongholds for the pro – reform opposition, which seeks to reduce the clerics ‘ domination.
Monday ‘ s protests were the largest in months — far bigger than the last major rallies on Nov. 4. The opposition has begun timing its marches to coincide with significant national events to help drum up a crowd. Monday ‘ s protests were held on National Students Day, when student rallies are traditionally held.
The most senior opposition supporter in the clerical leadership made a rare public show of backing for the students in comments over the weekend. Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a former president who usually works behind the scenes, warned that ” suppression is not the way to run a country. ”
” Most students are protesting the existing situation, ” he said. ” My heart breaks when I see that students are suppressed. “
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