Campus Cartoons Trigger Wave of Suppression : Kimia Sanati

TEHRAN -- A new wave of suppression, following the publication of a cartoon of Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei in several campus newspapers run by students of the prestigious Amirkabir University of Technology (AUT) ten days ago, has landed several student editors in jail. A joint-statement by the student editors denying involvement and stating that the newspapers were forged was not enough to stop the arrests. The students claimed that names and logos were misused to publish insulting and blasphemous material as part of an elaborately staged plot to begin the crackdown. At least seven AUT students are currently languishing in prison. All student publications have been banned by authorities at the university which has been the scene of protest gatherings by hard line student militia of the university and outside groups, gatherings of the accused student union's supporters and occasional clashes between the two groups, an AUT student told IPS on the condition of anonymity. A spokesman for the judiciary initially said five people who had been involved in the publication and distribution of the bulletins had been arrested and that 'there were no students among them,'' the independent Iranian Labour News Agency (ILNA) reported. Two of the editors of the four bulletins were arrested later. Hard line students, mainly affiliates of the militia, are allegedly supported by the university's chancellor and security setup. They have been demanding punishment over the article and the cartoon and a 'cultural revolution' to purge Iranian universities of dissident students. "For years the hard line establishment has tried to subdue students of AUT with very little success. The university has always been a scene of active political debate and new ideas so dangerous to the establishment," a student activist from the university told IPS on the condition of anonymity. "Just a few months ago President Ahmadinejad was booed and his picture was burned by angry students here while he was making an address on the occasion of the Students Day. Hardliners have since been awaiting a chance to retaliate. The university chancellor is an Ahmadinejad man, he is just applying the government policies in the university and giving every support to hard line militia students," she added. Established in 1958, AUT has an overall strength of 7,000 students, most of them in 14 engineering departments, five research centres and an associated university complex located at Tafresh, a town outside Tehran. Restrictions imposed on university students' activities and their social freedom, pressure on student unions and frequent arresting of student activists, pressure on non-conformist or politically minded professors and mismanagement of affairs by government-appointed chancellors has brought about great discontent and frequent unrest in various Iranian universities since President Ahmadinejad took over August 2005. After several years of disillusionment with reform prospects, the student movement in Iran has over the past year been gaining momentum again. "Hardliners are greatly troubled by the radical student movement and like the women's movement and that of workers' associations, consider it a huge threat to their power and hegemony," an analyst in Tehran who asked not to be named told IPS. "I believe there were several motives behind the scheme which largely failed due to accused student bodies' condemnation of blasphemous cartoons and remarks and their ability to avoid the trap set for them. If students hadn't acted wisely, insulting the prophet and Imams could be used as a very good excuse to crack down on them," the analyst said. Since early April, a large number of students, including 15 in Mazandaran university and three in AUT, have been arrested, tens have been summoned to their universities' disciplinary committees and several student activists, including the secretary of the Islamic Association of Students of Allameh Tababaie, one of Tehran's largest universities, have been barred by their universities' authorities from entering the campus. "Certain people who were humiliated in the past are now taking revenge and students must be alert and not provide them with excuses," Mehdi Karrubi, prominent reformist leader of Etemad Melli Party and former parliament speaker, was reported by ILNA as saying at a meeting with Mazandaran University student activists who are now free on bail. Mazandaran University students were arrested following unrest and a sit-in on Apr. 14 while protesting the arrest of a student activist and suspension of three more by the university. Protestors had been demanding freedom for student activities. On May 7-8, AUT students cancelled all classes and held elections to the Islamic Association's central council despite efforts to scuttle them. "The militia students tried to stop the elections and with the help of university security people tried to take away the ballot boxes, but students made a human wall to protect the ballot boxes. There was a shortage of ballot papers and the boxes were sealed and removed to a safe place later," one of the students told IPS. "The university security people who are naturally given authority and backing by the chancellor even attacked union offices in one of the faculties. They thought they could find ballot boxes there but failed to find them. They destroyed union property and later made an attack on a girls' resting hall, searched everyone's bags and broke the lockers," he said. In a separate incident, a 70-year-old professor of Tehran University, famous as the 'father of animation art in Iran', was expelled from the university last week for allegedly ‘insulting a female student's Islamic veil'. Hardliners known as Hizbullah have staged several gatherings in front of the university and in other universities and posted the professor's photo on walls with threats of assassinating him on their websites since then, Iranian news agencies reported. "The incident provided an excuse for hardliners to claim that moral corruption is prevailing in universities and there is need for purging them. They have been crying out for a cultural revolution again and the danger is serious," a professor of Tehran University told IPS on the condition of anonymity. "Cultural revolution has seriously been on the hardliners' agenda since they gained total control of all state bodies a little less than two years ago when Ahmadinejad took over from Khatami. Even if there isn't an extensive purge of dissidents in universities, they can expel the leading student activists and faculty to subdue the others," the professor said.