40-Days of Mourning for Neda

The traditional forty days of mourning for Neda Soltan were concluded today with thousands of protesters in the street. Defying orders to appear near the mosques and squares, mourners and protesters poured into the streets. This is similar to the beginning of the end for the Shah, thirty years ago. The continued crackdown on protests large and small seems to be splitting the armed security forces and Basij, possibly signaling fractured support for the government. The reports of death and torture of the arrested protesters is also fueling anger, particularly among student groups.

Revolutionary Road has a time count of the protests from today.

UPDATED: Ongoing Clashes in Iran

UPDATE 3: From Saeed Valabaygi: "Plainclothes forces with hot and cold weapons(gun and knife) along with organized cyclists attacked some of the politechnic dormitories. Plainclothes forces in a attack to Golashan dormitory in Beh Afarin St beaten up several students and dormitory's guards."

UPDATE 2: Reportedly, the owner of the openDemocracy blog, who has written about equal rights for women, has been arrested.

UPDATE 1: The BBC is confirming heavy riot police and Basij presence at and around Tehran University and the use of tear gas and the cut-off of mobile text messaging services. Reportedly arrests have been made, including the arrest of Mohammad ali Dadkhah, a lawyer representing the Human Rights Defender's Center.

Revolutionary Road is live blogging protests in Tehran that are being held on the tenth anniversary of the 1999 student uprising. If you're on Facebook, you can link to Saeed's FB updates off the Revolutionary Road website. He's reporting seeing military helicopters, tear gas attacks, random Basij attacks on buses and bystanders, and protests at the Chinese embassy.

The BBC has documented protests and clashes beginning yesterday, as has the Associated Press.

More to follow later this afternoon.

UPDATES: Protest Videos

UPDATES: The person, from whom many of my recently-posted videos and notes come, would like me to go ahead and site his blog by name. While this does reveal his name, he is firm in his desire to openly confront what he sees around him. The blog is Revolutionary Road. I am also placing it in my blogroll. Saeed is determined to call the regime what it is and demand justice and freedom. I hope you'll take the time to look at his site, and support him.

Hopefully, this post will work. Everytime I try to load some of these videos into a separate post (like the last one), the links don't correctly work. These are primarily from students I have contact with in Iran, although some are from regional news services and one is from the Times Online.

20 June 2009:

23 June 2009:

24 June 2009:

Tehran University

Candlelight Memorial and Vigil:

Basij Kill a Protestor:

Riot Police Crush Protests in Tehran (Times Online):

They Don't Really Care About Us

Since the media seems fixated on every second of every move made surrounding Michael Jackson's death, Iranian student protestors have latched on to one of his songs: 'They Don't Care About Us (The Prison Version).'  The music video shows some very interesting parallels.

Meanwhile, press freedoms are increasingly restricted.  A protest of new limitations placed on media and further arrests of journalists had been scheduled for Thursday, July 2nd, but has been cancelled due to a new 'national security system order.'  The Iranian Journalists Information Secretary issued the following statement: 'This meeting agenda was to support members of the journalist guild who a big number of them now are unemployed because of press closure and seizure and some of them were arrested. Therefore, Although Iran Journalists Union knows that they have the legal right to hold this meeting but to protect journalists security in the current situation, informs all members that meeting is canceled. Iran journalists guild forum announces that judiciary specially general and revolutionary courts,should reconsidering their behaviors to press and journalists companions faster and remove recent media restrictions according to the clear liberties in constitution and press law and also release all arrested journalists immediately.'

On the international front, Iran has unilaterally 'disqualified' the EU from participating in talks on Iran's nuclear program.  The EU may retaliate by expelling Iranian diplomats and recalling their own.  The BBC reports: 'Maj Gen Hassan Firouzabadi, Iran's chief of staff, accused the EU of "interference" in riots which followed June's disputed presidential elections.'  Even President Obama seems to be slowly concluding that dialogue with Iran may 'suffer' if the crackdown continues.

Videos taken by student protestors continue to come out including some of those posted here.

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