Students from two Iranian universities have issued statements of protest following the brutal treatment of a student demonstrator by a security officer at Tehran’s Allameh University.
The June 26 incident, during which a security officer violently struck a student’s head against stone steps, occurred in the context of a dispute over Iran’s strict dress code enforcement.
The incident was triggered by the university’s insistence on making the Maghna’eh — a black cloth covering the head, forehead, chin, and chest — mandatory for female students.
Whe students staged a sit-in at the university’s National Garden campus, their protest was met with violence by security forces.
In response to the incident, Allameh University students issued a statement which declared that “nothing will go back [to what it used to be like],” and stating, “We, who have become ‘We’ for almost a year, have no word for you except one: no.”
On June 27, students from North Tehran’s Azad University issued a statement in support of their Allameh University colleagues in which they decried the “audacity of the university security measures against the protesting student at Allameh University.”
The students’ statement, which called for universities “free from gender discrimination and political, religious, and ideological exclusion,” came amid growing tensions within Iran’s universities, which have been at the forefront of protests and gatherings against the Iranian regime.
The students also drew attention to the death in the custody of morality police in September of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, which ignited the current wave of nationwide protests, and urged further protests to ensure that the incident at Allameh University would not be repeated.
The Human Rights Activists News Agency says that at least 700 university students have been arrested during the recent unrest.
Many have faced sentences such as imprisonment or flogging, and dozens of students have been expelled from universities or suspended from their studies, as security forces try to stifle widespread dissent.
Source » rferl