Global Voices Online

Hundreds of students continued a protest at Shiraz University against “gender apartheid” on Tuesday 4th of March. The students want their university to put an end to a policy that began in February of separating men and women into different classrooms.

The students also asked the President of the university to resign and demanded better conditions in their cafeteria and dormitories. They also want to have the right to choose their own delegates. On March 4th, the protest movement entered its 8th day and several bloggers covered the story, while mainstream media in country ignored it.

Here is a video film of one of student protest movements, where the students chant: “It is our final message, student movement is ready for rebellion”.

In a blog that calls itself “Socialist Students of Bahonar department of Shiraz”, we read:

A couple of hundred students chanted slogans such as “Security and peace is our absolute right” (the Iranian government usually uses a nuclear energy is our absolute right slogan). The university is not a military base.

The blogger adds that the university authorities promised protesters they would deal with their demands in the first days of demonstrations. But it seems nothing happened in reality.

The blogger says that the freedom of students has been restricted in the university because of military presence that enforces discrimination against women and girls.

Another blogger, “Socialist students of literature at Shiraz University”, protests [Fa] against the separation of genders in classes, and calls it a crime against humanity. The blogger writes that some students have been mistreated and that the growing military presence is disturbing for students.

Ta Azadi 86 writes [Fa] that the protest movement goes on while the authorities grow. The blogger says:

About 10 students were asked to appear in court. Several university professors were among the students. Basiji forces wanted to disrupt the demonstration but student resistance pushed them away.

AmirKabir Khabarnameh, a leading student information website, writes Fa] that several students' families were contacted by security forces and asked to stop their children from participating in the protest movement.