Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Monday December 14th, 2009

Student Information Center (SIC)

Newsletter Issue 143 - Monday December 14th, 2009                                                                                                                                                              


Future events
Start organizing and preparing for demonstrations during the initial days of Moharram month.

News
--BBC: MirHossein Moosavi said that the demands of people from the government has augmented and the some 'redlines' that have been passed by some people are due to heavy and brutal crackdown of the opposition by the government. He said that people have the right to ask questions and this right should be fulfilled, and not be replied by violence. If today the demands have augmented, it is due to the initial mis-response. Also regarding the Dec. 7th demonstrations he said that "non-students are brought inside the university with batons and they name themselves students and then they say that students threw tear gas at each other. This nothing but a deception and mockery and nobody would believe students to have tear gas. It is better to be honest with people. If this militaristic atmosphere is not removed, the movements will go more underground and will become more radical.

--Rahe-Sabz: Mirhossein Moosavi and Mehdi Karoubi, opposition leaders are willing to ask for a permit to perform a rally in protest against dis-honor given to Khomeini - regarding his photo being torn on state TV.

--Rahe-Sabz: Mohammad Khatami, former president again asked for release of detained students and gave sympathy to the fact that this year's student day was held at a time that even more students are detained than before.

--RadioFarda: Iran's formal news agency has asked news groups to decrease cleric rank of Rafsanjani from "Ayatollah" to "Hojjatol-Eslam".

--Rooz Online: The Supreme Leader used the pretext of the destruction of Imam Khomeini's pictures to voice his attack against the Green movement and it's leaders Mr. Mousavi and Mr. Karoubi. 

--Radio Zamaneh: Mojtaba Zavalnoury, hardliner representatives of Khamenei for the revolutionary Guard made some explicit and volatile comments against the reformist movement. 

--Green Movement Path(Jrs): Mohammad Reza Zafarghandi, former head of Tehran University was invited to a ceremony held by the Islamic Association of Medical Sciences. Here, he criticized the state media's coverage of recent allegations of the destructions of pictures of Imam Khomeini and added that this was a pre-organized plan. He then stated :"It is a hideous act to tear up pictures of Imam, but what is even worse is to go against his words. Imam specifically demanded that the military forces should stay away from politics. Yet today, the Revolutionary Guard is heavily involved in both the political as well as the economical arena". Regarding the Green movement, he added :" If they claim that the Green movement only has a few followers, then why don't they give them permission for rallies so that this affair gets clarified".

--Advarnews: Ehsan Bodaghi, political activist was arrested on Saturday

University News
RadioFarda: Students of Tehran University gathered again in a demonstration against actions taken against students in the past events.

--Rooz Online: Students of University of Science and Technology in Tehran announced that until their detained classmates are released, and that military forces leave the campus grounds, they will continue to protest on the campus and boycott the classes. Starting yesterday, they will commence their protests everyday at 12:30. 

--Wave of Freedom: At Sahand University in the city of Tabriz, students armed with Green ribbons, scarves and wristbands interefered during a Basij ceremony where a hardliner cleric was giving a speech. They prevented him from uttering insulting comments against Ayatollah Montazeri, a renowned senior reformist cleric. They did so by shouting slogans such as:" Basij are Fascists, they get payed to stand there", "Death to liar", "You shout Hossein Hossein, but rape is your pride", "If the Basij was not there, Taraneh would be with us" [Taraneh was a young women who was raped and brutally murdered by the Basij after the elections unrest]. It is reported that this was followed by the Basij students retaliation. However, due to the fact that they were out-numbered by reformist students, they retracted. 

--Radio Zamaneh: Despite the passage of one week since Iranian Student Day (7th of December), student protest continued this week. Universities in Tehran, Semnan, Hamedan, Tabriz, Tusi and kashan were some of the sites of student protests. The Islamic Association of Tehran University Medical Sciences spokesman said that while Mr. Mousavi and Khatami were not given persmission to join our campus, we showed their video message to the students. However, several other reformist figures were present at the University. 

Analysis
--Rooz Online: Several security documents regarding the Qods day protests were leaked out to some reformist media sources. These files highlight the reports that the security forces gave to their chiefs. Some interesting points are highlighted here. First, the report expressed concern over the presence of several government and security members and officials amongst the protesters. Presumably, he report expresses concern that there might be fractions from within. Secondly, they highlight the presence of women. They state that the presence of women and girls among protesters are not only indecent but also encourage the men to protest more. So the female presence has a negative effect. They also propose several methods to deal with the protesters. They recommend the method of intimidation and threatening on social and political fronts, to the point that the protesters have no choice but to retreat.








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