Iranian students have stepped up their protests despite a crackdown by security forces, who are said to have cornered and shot dead a number of students at a prestigious Tehran university on Sunday night.
Anti-government protests, sparked by the death of a young woman in police custody in mid-September, have spread across the country at varying intensities, revealing a cultural divide between Iran’s educated youth and an older male religious establishment.
In his initial remarks on the protests, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei strongly supported the security forces and accused the US and Israel – the Islamic Republic’s arch-enemies – of orchestrating the unrest. “If there had been no discussion of the young woman’s death, at that point they would have used another pretext to foment riots and unrest,” Khamenei said Monday.
The British Foreign Office has summoned Iran’s top diplomat over the London raid. Secretary of State James Cleverly described the violence against protesters as “really shocking”.
“Today we made our position clear to the Iranian authorities – instead of blaming external actors for the unrest, they should take responsibility for their actions and listen to the concerns of their people,” he said.
Concerns have grown over recent violence at Sharif University of Technology in Tehran, where local media reported riot police confronted hundreds of students with officers using tear gas and paintball guns and carrying non-lethal steel ball guns, local media reported. Many students were arrested and taken away in police cars or ambulances when parents and others came to rescue them.
“Woman, life, freedom,” students shouted, and “students prefer death to humiliation,” reported the Mehr news agency, adding that Iran’s Minister of Science, Mohammad Ali Zolfigol, came to speak with the students to discuss the situation to calm down .
Oslo-based group Iran Human Rights released a video that appears to show Iranian police officers on motorcycles chasing students running through an underground parking lot, and in a separate clip, take away detainees whose heads are covered with black cloth bags.
In other footage, which has not been independently verified, gunshots and screams can be heard as large numbers of people run down a street at night. In a clip recorded at a Tehran subway station, according to IHR, a crowd can be heard shouting, “Don’t be afraid! No fear! We’re all together!”
In what appeared to be a coordinated ambush by plainclothes officers to arrest the students, local witnesses said about a dozen were shot dead with a combination of plastic bullets and electric batons.
The student union Islamic Association of Sharif University said in a statement on Monday that more than 30 had been arrested and the security services had been accused of barbaric treatment, particularly of women, and compared the mental status of the students, some of whom were only on their second day at the university until towards times of war.
The New York-based Center for Human Rights in Iran said it was “extremely concerned by videos coming out of Sharif University and Tehran today showing the violent repression of protests and detainees being dragged away with their heads fully covered in cloth “.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei told army cadets in Tehran on Monday that the US and Israel were responsible for the protests. Photo: Anadolu Agency/Getty ImagesCyber attacks on the websites of government institutions, including the judiciary, continued on Monday as reports surfaced of lawyers being arrested and detained. Nevertheless, large numbers of students were again on the move in Tehran and Isfahan. Despite efforts by Iranian authorities to block students from using social media to tell the world about the protests, images showed large crowds gathering.
“It is hard to bear what is happening at Sharif University in Iran,” said German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock. tweeted on Monday. “The courage of the Iranians is incredible. And the regime’s brute force is an expression of sheer fear of the power of education and freedom.”
Canada’s Foreign Minister Mélanie Jolly also announced sanctions against 25 individuals and nine entities for human rights violations. Jolly said the ongoing persecution of Iranian women must stop.
Meenna, a student, said: “We are witnessing the worst form of police violence. We will not tolerate their restrictions and will not adhere to the regime’s strict dress code. It’s our life and we have the right to choose.
“I have seen dead bodies on the streets and streets and we will not allow their blood to be wasted. The future of the students under this regime is aiming, committing violence and killing with bullets and direct fire; Our future is bleak under this regime, we will fight against it.”
Education union leaders called for a nationwide strike by teachers and students in response to Sunday’s violence.
Security forces and politicians seemed to think they have public support for a crackdown, but risk angering a fatalistic or cowed older middle class. Many of the older middle class, trained by previous defeats for protesters and crushed by economic sanctions, have refrained from taking part in recent protests because they see no point in forcing the government to change its mind.
A session of Iran’s parliament on Sunday showed little willingness to compromise on the headscarf requirement or the methods of Iran’s moral police, the two main causes of the protests.
Instead, the focus was on the role of foreign media and agents, as well as Iranian celebrities, in allegedly fueling the protests. Iran’s foreign ministry said it has issued serious warnings to some countries that they are harboring “lie factories,” a reference to the widespread news outlets broadcasting to Iran.
The protests began in response to the death in custody of 22-year-old Iranian Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini, who was jailed for allegedly violating strict dress codes.
A group of female prisoners in Tehran’s Evin prison issued a statement of support for the students. “Our hearts, our screams and our fists are with the hearts and screams of the people every moment,” they said.
Former footballers also continued to support the protesters, including Mehdi Mahdavikia, the 2003 Asian Footballer of the Year, who wrote on social media: “For several decades you have turned Iran’s elites into nationalists by repressing students and hitting them at every opportunity flee capital. Important posts are in the hands of illiterate people.”
Ali Karimi, who played 127 times for the Iranian soccer team, also supported the protesters.
Agence France-Presse contributed to this report