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Politics : War -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: hal jordan who wrote (18323)	12/8/2002 9:08:05 AM
From: lorne	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 23908

Hal. IMO. Very very important movement in the moslem world. Police storm crowd outside Tehran University as students protest. Sunday December 8, 9:00 AM Iranian police violently dispersed a crowd outside Tehran University and arrested around 70 people after demonstrating on-campus students called for the nation's judicial chief to resign. About 2,000 people gathered on Enqelab (Revolution) Avenue outside the campus where police had formed a barrier of buses to block views of students protesting inside. On campus, roughly 3,000 students authorized to hold a rally on university grounds to mark National Student Day also protested the hardline judiciary's death sentence against dissident academic Hashem Aghajari. After calling for the resignation of judiciary chief Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, whom they blame for the harsh sentence, students urged those in the street to "come and join us". Some in the street shouted "free political prisoners" in solidarity with the students, while others showed up out of curiosity. In mid-afternoon, the situation degenerated when students hurled rocks at Islamic hardliners gathered outside the gates and took aim at the buses, breaking some windows. Around 2,000 police and anti-riot forces deployed around the campus then violently dispersed the off-campus crowd with truncheons and tear gas. Some 60 to 70 people were arrested during the intervention, but very few were students, interior ministry official Ali Taala was quoted by the student news agency ISNA as saying. ISNA added that one of its photographers was arrested in the melee. Authorities had earlier warned that protests spilling into the streets would elicit a police reaction. A student organizer told AFP earlier no gatherings had been planned outside the university. Hardline Basij militia members -- who clashed with students in November during earlier Aghajari protests -- gathered in larger numbers around the campus, prompting the university vice-president to urge students to disperse because he feared the Basij would intervene. ISNA said Basijis pursued street protestors into the news agency's offices near the campus, beating those who had taken refuge there. The students dispersed in the early evening. State television later aired images of the students and clashes outside the university in the first such broadcast since pro-Aghajari protests began on November 9, followed by past speeches of supreme leader Ali Khamenei saying Iran's enemies have tried to mobilize students against the Islamic revolution, but have always failed. The Basij, who report directly to powerful conservative Iranian factions, were quick to brand the campus protests as "illegal". Demonstrations were forbidden late last month after student activists staged two weeks of protests over Aghajari's sentence. The verdict is now under judicial review following an order from Khamenei. Earlier, students in and around the university amphitheater could be seen carrying portraits of Aghajari and pictures of three students killed during the 1953 repression of protests against the visit of then US-vice president Richard Nixon. The killings during the late shah's reign has since been commemorated as National Student Day. On Saturday, organizers tried to ensure only bona-fide students entered the amphitheater to prevent hardliners causing trouble, but about 30 nonetheless made it inside and sparked verbal exchanges. The students took up slogans used during the Aghajari protests: "Death to the Taliban, from Kabul to Tehran" and "Taliban of Iran, it will soon be your turn." They demanded the liberation of political prisoners and called on moderate President Mohammed Khatami to push through political and economic reforms. Students also staged rallies at universities in Shiraz and in Isfahan to back Khatami in his bid to pass two reform bills limiting the power of conservatives, who control the courts and armed forces. Unlike previous occasions, Khatami was not scheduled to address the students on Saturday. Conservative students also planned rallies on Sunday. The Aghajari verdict ignited the largest such student actions in the Iran since July 1999, when protests degenerated into several days of violence. sg.news.yahoo.com