http://www.arabnews.com/?page=4§ion=0&article=129552&d=14&m=12&y=2009
Monday 14 December 2009 (27 Dhul Hijjah 1430)
New row over burned Khomeini photo
Ali Akbar Dareini | AP
TEHRAN: Police surrounded the campus of Tehran University on Sunday,
trapping hundreds of students protesting what they said were fabricated
government images showing the burning of a photo of the revered founder of the
Islamic republic.
State television has repeatedly shown images, ostensibly taken during
opposition protests on Dec. 7, of unidentified hands burning the picture of
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini - a grave and illegal insult against a man who
remains widely respected in the country.
The students protesting on Sunday contended the images were fabricated by
government agents and are being used to justify further crackdowns on the
opposition.
Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, called for calm but
indirectly accused the opposition of creating a hostile environment.
"Some have converted the election campaign into a campaign against the
entire system," Khamenei said without naming any opposition leaders. "We call
on those who are angry to remain calm." Reformists, including former
presidential candidate Mir Hossein Musavi, maintain that their supporters had
nothing to do with the burning of the picture, which they say is being used by
the regime to discredit the opposition.
The Dec. 7 rallies, the largest protests in months, did see numerous
attacks on the current supreme leader of the country, Khamenei.
Students chanted slogans against him, burned and trampled his photos in
unprecedented acts of defiance in a country where Khamenei has final say in all
state matters.
Dozens of police surrounded the campus of Tehran University again on
Sunday as inside hundreds of pro-reform students protesting inside denied
accusations they had any connection with the images.
The elite Revolutionary Guard called on Sunday for the trial and
punishment of those responsible for burning the photo as it continues to
pressure the opposition.
"The Revolutionary Guard ... won't tolerate any silence or hesitation in
the immediate identification, trial and punishment of those carrying out this
ugly insult and the agents behind them," it said in a statement posted on its
website.
Under the law, insult to the late or current supreme leader can lead to
two years of prison.
The Guard, which is tasked with defending the clerical regime that came
to power in Iran in 1979 under Khomeini's leadership after the pro-US shah was
overthrown, was at the forefront of squashing Iran's post-election unrest.
Reformists contend that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was re-elected in
fraudulent June contests and for months protested against the government before
widespread crackdowns.
