Demonstrations against Iran's clerical rulers appeared to be dying down on their seventh night yesterday with uniformed police reining in Islamic militants who attacked protesters with clubs and chains on previous nights.
Hundreds of cars once more formed thick traffic jams around Tehran University, the focus of the unrest, with drivers blaring their horns to show support for the students, but their numbers were fewer than before and there was less tension in the air.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Police guarded a cordon around the university in the center of the city and manned roadblocks to stop plainclothes Islamic hardliners mounted on motorcycles from getting near the campus.
While the Islamic militants report ultimately to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, the police are responsible both to the government of President Mohammad Khatami and Khamenei.
The unrest was first sparked by small student protests against proposed university privatizations, but gained momentum when thousands of ordinary people flocked to the campus after calls on US-based Iranian satellite channels.
The demonstrations differed from protests in previous years in that then students had been largely left to go it alone and the frequent calls for action by exile television channels had been mostly ignored. They also had no clear agenda or goal.
"Every night I came here and brought my family to take part in the protests, but unfortunately because there is no leader, they are condemned to die," said Hashem, a civil servant.
The protesters reserved most of their rage for conservative clerics who control the key reins of power in Iran, but have also condemned the moderate Khatami, accusing him of failing to deliver promised change after six years in office.
But in the early hours yesterday, the violent slogans against the clerics which enraged hardline vigilantes were gone, replaced with the sound of car horns.
"It looks like it may calm down for a bit now. But it won't take much to make it flare up again," said one Asian diplomat. "We may see this cycle for some time."
Many in the cars edging slowly through the midnight traffic remained defiant.
"We will come out onto the streets again," vowed teacher Mina.
"This will continue because we want freedom."
Iran blames the US for stirring up the unrest and on Monday said it had sent an official protest to Washington for what it called blatant interference in its internal affairs.
US officials have applauded the protests as a fight for freedom by the Iranian people.
"This is the beginning of people expressing themselves toward a free Iran which I think is positive," said US President George W. Bush.
A spokesman for British Prime Minister Tony Blair said the demonstrations appeared to reflect frustration at the lack of progress in reform.
"But clearly we believe that constructive dialogue not violent protest is the best way forward," he said.
CONDITIONS: The Russian president said a deal that was scuppered by ‘elites’ in the US and Europe should be revived, as Ukraine was generally satisfied with it Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday said that he was ready for talks with Ukraine, after having previously rebuffed the idea of negotiations while Kyiv’s offensive into the Kursk region was ongoing. Ukraine last month launched a cross-border incursion into Russia’s Kursk region, sending thousands of troops across the border and seizing several villages. Putin said shortly after there could be no talk of negotiations. Speaking at a question and answer session at Russia’s Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Putin said that Russia was ready for talks, but on the basis of an aborted deal between Moscow’s and Kyiv’s negotiators reached in Istanbul, Turkey,
In months, Lo Yuet-ping would bid farewell to a centuries-old village he has called home in Hong Kong for more than seven decades. The Cha Kwo Ling village in east Kowloon is filled with small houses built from metal sheets and stones, as well as old granite buildings, contrasting sharply with the high-rise structures that dominate much of the Asian financial hub. Lo, 72, has spent his entire life here and is among an estimated 860 households required to move under a government redevelopment plan. He said he would miss the rich history, unique culture and warm interpersonal kindness that defined life in
AERIAL INCURSIONS: The incidents are a reminder that Russia’s aggressive actions go beyond Ukraine’s borders, Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrii Sybiha said Two NATO members on Sunday said that Russian drones violated their airspace, as one reportedly flew into Romania during nighttime attacks on neighboring Ukraine, while another crashed in eastern Latvia the previous day. A drone entered Romanian territory early on Sunday as Moscow struck “civilian targets and port infrastructure” across the Danube in Ukraine, the Romanian Ministry of National Defense said. It added that Bucharest had deployed F-16 warplanes to monitor its airspace and issued text alerts to residents of two eastern regions. It also said investigations were underway of a potential “impact zone” in an uninhabited area along the Romanian-Ukrainian border. There
A French woman whose husband has admitted to enlisting dozens of strangers to rape her while she was drugged on Thursday told his trial that police had saved her life by uncovering the crimes. “The police saved my life by investigating Mister Pelicot’s computer,” Gisele Pelicot told the court in the southern city of Avignon, referring to her husband — one of 51 of her alleged abusers on trial — by only his surname. Speaking for the first time since the extraordinary trial began on Monday, Gisele Pelicot, now 71, revealed her emotion in almost 90 minutes of testimony, recounting her mysterious