Weeks after authorities crushed deadly anti-government protests that had rocked Iran, students in the country again chanted slogans on Saturday in the latest display of outrage against the clerical regime.
The gatherings at universities came after a mass protest movement last month that was met with a government crackdown that left thousands dead, local and diaspora media reported.
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Fresh anti-regime protests rock Iran
Visuals showed large crowds at Tehran’s top engineering university clashing in a packed area as people were reportedly heard shouting “bi sharaf”, or “disgraceful” in Farsi.
Footage shared by Iran International, which operates from outside the country, also showed a big crowd chanting anti-government slogans at Tehran’s Sharif University of Technology.
The protests were met with force as paramilitary units linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) were sent in to suppress demonstrators, the outlet reported. The Fars news agency later reported injuries from scuffles at the university.
One video allegedly showed rows of marchers at Sharif University denouncing Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as a “murderous leader”, and urging Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran’s toppled shah, to become a new monarch, Reuters reported.
Demonstrations were also reported at Beheshti and Amir Kabir universities in Tehran and at Mashhad University in the northeast, according to videos released by rights group HAALVSH.
In the country’s western town of Abdanan, known as a protest hotspot, demonstrators chanted “Death to Khamenei” and “Death to the dictator” after an activist teacher was arrested, according to rights group Hengaw and posts on social media.
Iran protests and tensions with the US
The unrest began in December over prolonged economic pressure, but grew into mass anti-government protests that were put down in a violent crackdown by security forces.
The clerical leadership says more than 3,000 people died, but claims the violence resulted from “terrorist acts” driven by Iran’s enemies.
The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), however, has documented more than 7,000 deaths in the crackdown, most of them protesters, though the real number could be much higher.
Iranian officials first accepted the legitimacy of protesters’ economic concerns, but as demonstrations turned openly against the government, they accused their rivals, the United States and Israel, of fuelling “riots”.
The crackdown led US President Donald Trump to threaten military action, though his focus later shifted to Iran’s nuclear programme, which Western governments fear is meant to produce a bomb.
The US and Iran recently restarted Oman-mediated talks on a possible deal, but Washington has also increased its military presence in the region, sending two aircraft carriers, jets and weapons to support its warnings.
With inputs from agencies
