Rooz spoke with Bahareh Hedayat, a senior figure in the Daftar Tahkim Vahdat student alumni organization whose leaders were arrested in Iran’s post June 12 presidential election turmoil on the recent student arrests and student demonstrations on November 4th. “I heard with my own ears that one of the Passdaran Guard field commanders told his force which was only threatening demonstrators with their batons not to be considerate and hit them,” she said.
Ms Hedayat, a well-known student activist, said this regarding Wednesday’s demonstrations: “At 10am about 5,000 were demonstrating on Ghods avenue of Tehran University when they were stopped as the gates were blocked to prevent them from leaving the campus. So the demonstrators returned to the university and began going towards the main gates and stayed about 30 feet outside the university for hours, where they chanted slogans. All wore green markings – the color of the opposition movement – and changed some strong slogans. On the sides stood some fifty para-military Basijis who also chanted some provocative slogans, such as death to the hypocrites. There were also some university police force members inside the campus, behind who stood Passdaran Guard riot police squads. Then they brought water canons to threaten and disperse the students. Outside the university, they had lined up buses to separate the public from the students.”
She continues, “Students intended to go and gather across the former US embassy, but government agents had gathered a small number of pro-government demonstrators on the same street (Taleghani avenue) and did not allow the protesting public to go there. In reality, they wanted to keep all their supporters in one place to video them and pretend that a very large group had gathered for the demonstrations. But in reality, in many parts of Tehran, including Vali Asr square, Argentine square, Vali Asr avenue, Motahari avenue and Haft Tir square which I had witnessed one could see the public. Of course security forces did not allow people to gather and as soon as their numbers reached fifty people, anti-riot forces would attack the public and violently beat them up and dispersed them. Then the guards channeled the demonstrators into side streets and the Guards attacked them, hitting them all over. They also widely used pepper and tear gas against the demonstrating public.”
In response to the question how violent were the anti-riot police, she said, “They had absolutely no qualms over being violent. I heard with my own ears that one of the Passdaran Guard field commanders told his force which was only threatening demonstrators with their batons not to be considerate and hit them. He encouraged his forces to beat up people, particularly those who were isolated from the rest of the crowds and they beat them savagely.”
Commenting on the slogans that were chanted, she said, “The slogans that students chanted were very different from those that people chanted outside the university. An example of the harshest chants outside was ‘Khamenei you are a criminal, and your regime is void.’ Inside the university, on the other hand, the chants were even stronger.”
On the arrests that were made during the last 48 hours, Bahareh Hedayat said, “After midnight on Wednesday, Mohammad Hashemi’s house was raided. The residents of the house asked for warrants and documents, but the agents did not have them and so broke the entrance and entered the house after an hour. They blind folded and hand cuffed Hashemi and began searching the house without preparing a list of items in the house, which is a completely illegal act. They left the house without any arrests. But they returned today as ordinary citizens and arrested Mohammad Hashemi. He remained in detention for about six-seven hours and was then released. On Wednesday night, they had also gone to arrest Milad Assadi, a member of Daftar Tahkim Vahdat’s central council who was not in his home. Meanwhile, Mohammad Sadeghi and Hassan Assadi, both members of the organization’s central council were arrested three nights ago.”
