The demonstrators, mostly women and teenagers, responded by throwing stones and bricks at the Guards. At least five Revolutionary Guards were beaten by protesters and tires were set on fire to neutralize the effect of tear gas.
Brigadier General Hedayatollah Lotfian, Greater Tehran's State Security Forces commander, personally oversaw the suppression of the uprising. In addition to State Security Forces and the para-military Bassij, special anti-riot units were dispatched to the area.
Massoudieh uprising is the fourth major antigovernment demonstration in the capital in the past two months.
During the clashes, protesters destroyed three buses and 14 vehicles of the Guards Corps and the State Security Forces and six municipality vehicles. Residents also smashed windows of the local branches of Saderat and Tejarat banks and set their furniture and a number municipality's kiosks on fire. They broke through the rear wall of District 6 municipality building and destroyed its furniture and other materials.
In the past three days, hundreds of Massoudieh residents have converged on the location where a number of houses were demolished to prevent the demolition of the rest of the homes by the Guards Corps units stationed in the area. A number of people are refusing to leave their homes, contending that the houses must be demolished on their heads and that their bodies will have to be removed from the homes, because if they leave, they have nowhere else to go.
The National Council of Resistance of Iran draws the attention of international human rights organizations to the state of those arrested and calls for immediate intervention to save the lives of the detainees.
Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran
July 9, 1998
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