BAGHDAD - An Iranian exile opposition group on Monday called on pro-democracy students in Iran to carry on with demonstrations across the country, a statement by the group said.

The statement, distributed to reporters in Baghdad, said the leader of the opposition Mujahideen Khalq, Massoud Rajavi, urged the students "to continue holding protests and demonstrations everywhere with courage and resolve."

Rajavi also called them to "insist on the release of all detained students."

He accused the Tehran government of finding false pretexts to crack down on students. "It will be claimed that the reason State Security Forces...charged into the students' dormitories on Thursday night was to save the lives of three SSF members taken hostage by the students," the statement said.
 
 

Iran Opposition Group Says Many Protesters Killed, Reuters, July 12

The opposition National Council of Resistance in Iran said many demonstrators had been killed by security forces during protests in Tehran Monday.

"A large number of demonstrators were shot and killed and hundreds were wounded," the group, which has offices in Britain and the United States, said in a statement released in London.

It said the number of people arrested at the 100,000-strong demonstration was not known "but the detainees were hoarded on scores of buses and minibuses of the state security forces and taken to prison."

It said that five security force vehicles and three government buses were set on fire by the demonstrators in the Tehran University area.
 
 

Rally Supports Students in Iran, The Washington Post, July 12

Hundreds of demonstrators gathered yesterday afternoon in Lafayette Square in a show of solidarity for the thousands who have been protesting in Iran since Friday, when police there cracked down on activist students. U.S. Park Police reported no arrests.…

Protesters who gathered across from the White House called the police raid on students "Bloody Friday" and asked for an international investigation. "Policymakers in the West, they don't understand the realities in Iran," said Soona Samsami, a member of the National Council of Resistance of Iran.
 
 

Tear Gas And Gunpowder Fill Night Air of Tehran, Reuters, July 12

TEHRAN - Tear gas, mixed with the stench of gunpowder and burning tires, filled the streets of central Tehran Monday, as police and club-wielding Islamic vigilantes set upon students to end five days of pro-democracy protests.

Lines of ambulances headed down the main thoroughfares near Tehran University throughout the evening, as Islamic militants tried to storm student positions outside the main dormitory complex.

Inside the campus mosque, about 50 injured students sheltered on the carpeted floors as medical students attended to their wounds. Some had head injuries, while others breathed laboriously after inhaling too much tear gas.

"The night sky was white with tear gas," said one television cameraman. "Everything was burning."

Sympathy demonstrations by students were reported in several Iranian cities on Monday, including Mashhad, Yazd and Shahroud.
 
 

Khatami Struggles to Contain Tehran Protests, Reuters, July 12

TEHRAN - Mohammad Khatami and his allies in the student movement on Monday called for a peaceful end to five days of furious pro-democracy rallies at Tehran University that threaten the administration's agenda.

But witnesses said fresh violence erupted as club-wielding police clashed with student protesters in a Tehran square near the university campus.

The crackdown was designed to enforce an order by Iran's Supreme National Security Council late on Sunday that warned against unauthorized demonstrations.

Khatami, who chairs the council, called directly on the students to respect law and order and devote their energies to his policy of reform within Iran's Islamic system.

"Now, students should cooperate with the government and allow law and order to be established in society," said Khatami.

Some student leaders, struggling to maintain their hold on the swelling crowds, implored their classmates to remain inside the university gates and not provide any pretext for a crackdown that could undermine Khatami's agenda.

"The aim of the enemies of freedom is to push the students into the streets in order to provoke a riot," a leader of the Islamic Society of Students of Tehran University told Reuters However, students vowed they would keep up their action until their demands were met.

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