Back to Brief on Iran
Young people and students supporting the Mojahedin engaged in extensive distribution of statements and leaflets in streets around Tehran University yesterday afternoon, the Mojahedin Command inside Iran reported.
The leaflets carried slogans such as "down with Khamenei," "down with Khatami," "down with dictatorship," "hail to Maryam Rajavi," "hail to Massoud Rajavi," and " "long live the Mojahedin."
The clerical regime immediately dispatched Revolutionary Guards, Intelligence Ministry and State Security Forces agents and Ansar-e Hezbollah club-wielders to control the area and arrest Mojahedin supporters.
In a directive issued on
April 23, the para-military Bassij forces' command ordered the Bassij forces
in 22 districts in the capital to increase the number of its intelligence
agents to counter "any activities by pro-Monafeqin [Mojahedin] elements
undermining security," including "distribution of statements, declarations,
communiqués, and slogan writing" as well as "sit-ins and gatherings."
Iran's People Still In Need Of Prosperity And Freedom, The Financial Times, April 24
... Tehran's Revolutionary Court... has detained about 70 political activists - mostly students, journalists and academics...
The manner of the arrests illustrated Iran's dual power structure. Instead of using the services of the police and the intelligence ministry... the courts have employed the Revolutionary Guards to carry out intelligence gathering and the arrests. The political detainees are being held in a prison run by the guards...
While pro-reform strategists
appear confident that the repressive actions of the hardliners will react
against them, the mood on the university campuses... is
increasingly of anger and
despondency.
Last Tuesday, several hundred
students gathered at Tehran's Amir Kabir University... to hear speeches
defending the arrested nationalists. Some speakers even
dared to cross one of the
"red lines" in Iranian politics by attacking Mr. Khamenei for his support
of the media crackdown and for failing to curb the judges he has
appointed...
Even Mr. Khatami was not
spared criticism. "Unfortunately the president elected by 20m people only
expresses regret," the student said. "Mr. President, you
are not an ordinary citizen
to express regret but you should stand against illegal acts."...
Few expect a smooth election
and allegations of ballot-rigging made by both sides during last year's
parliamentary polls are likely to be repeated... ... Last week, the
administration's Management and Planning Organization disclosed that 40
per cent of Iranians are living in "absolute and relative poverty", while
a conservative newspaper quoted a survey reporting that 7.7 per cent of
the population over 15 is suffering from depression. More than two decades
after the Islamic revolution, Iran's people are still in need of a government
that will bring them prosperity and freedom.
Iran Tea Growers Attack State Vehicles, IRNA (State News Agency), April 23
TEHRAN - Over 1,000 tea growers
in the northern Caspian coast city of Langerud, furious over a delay in
the purchase of their crops by the State Tea Organization, last
Thursday [19 April] attacked
and set fire to government vehicles in protest, ISNA news agency said Sunday.
Last October, private tea growers in northern Iran on the Caspian Sea said their livelihood was threatened by unregulated foreign tea imports.
[Iran Zamin News Agency in
a related statement reported that Hundreds of State Security Forces (SSF)
agents, equipped with anti-riot gear, were sent to the scene to suppress
the protest, but tea growers and farmers set fire to tires, and set up
barricades and punctured the tires of security forces' cars, blocking their
advance. A
number of SSF vehicles were
also set on fire. Several security agents who attacked the crowd were beaten
up by protesters.]
Khatami's Deputy Interion Minister Back In Court, Agence France Presse, April 24
TEHRAN - The embattled deputy
interior minister Mostafa Tajzadeh appeared before a Tehran court Tuesday
over his presumed role in a violent unrest last year
surrounding a pro-reform
student conference.
Tajzadeh, already sentenced
to a year in prison on vote fraud charges, responded to questions posed
by administrative court judge Ali Nazari Mofrad, state radio
said, but gave no further
details.
The deputy minister, who
was supposed to supervise the June 8 presidential polls, is being tried
in connection with several days of unrest in the western city of
Khoramabad last August.