Neda Iran

Sunday, June 21, 2009 at 1:01 pm

TORONTO : While speaking to an Iranian Ph.D student at Ryerson University yesterday, I began to truly understand the magnitude of what is currently happening in Iran. These protests and demonstrations represent much more than a disapproval of election results, but also an uprising of a people historically oppressed by a power-hungry supreme leader.

It’s a revolution against an Islamic Republic that puts its own needs and wants in front of the people that it governs, or so the Ph.D student put it.

Saturday’s protests in Iran were full of violence. People were shot, beaten and tear gassed in the streets. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told the public in his speech Friday that more demonstrations were prohibited. He said that if the people continued to revolt, Mousavi and the opposition would be responsible for what happened to them.

He also said these protests won’t force the ruling regime into a corner. He said, basically, these outbursts are useless.

The people are however challenging the very foundation of not only the supreme leadership, but the Islamic Republic as well.

Protests turn deadly

Some sources say a bomb went off outside a mosque and killed three or four people. Other say people were being shot dead in the streets. Some claim military tanks were deployed. Reports of helicopters landing at universities are coming through via Iranian twitter accounts. More twitter accounts claim Basiji are ntering homes and attacking civilians.

Hospital officials say 19 died today during the demonstrations. The death toll could be as high as 150.

http://blastmagazine.com