One student, who works as apart time journalist for an Iranian media, said the sudden, unexpected after midnight raid by the attackers caught the students by surprise, specially because of the time of the attack, hundred policemen and revolutionary guards were in the campus.

Several Iranian internet newspapers sites confirmed Saturday the over night arrest by unidentified plainclothes men of three leading and influential journalists and political activists close to the banned Nationalist-religious movement, namely Mr. Taqi Rahmani, Mr. Reza Alijani and Mr. Hoda Saber.

"The attack was so violent, so savage that it took the students, many of them sleepy, some time to defend themselves. The attackers knifed the students; beat them with electric cable, bicycle chains and clubs. Others were thrown out of the windows and once landing on the pavement, other thugs downstairs would lynch them. One could see the walls stained by blood", he told an Iran Press Service correspondent, asking his name and the media he works for not be disclosed.

In a statement from Paris, the National Council of Iranian Resistance, the political wing of the Baghdad-based Mohajedeen Khalq Organisation (MKO) said in the attack on the Beheshti University dormitory (formerly National University), 500 students were wounded, some of them taken to Shaari’ati and Fatemi hospitals for immediate medical treatment.

But the authorities said only 12 protesters had been arrested.

The attack was deliberately provoked by the authorities, as is took place when some student’s leaders had appealed for calm and momentary suspension of the protest movement, which had started five nights ago and continued unabated, supported by thousands of ordinary people, most then young ones of both sexes from middle class rank of the society.

The attack was a reminder of that of the night of 9 July 1999, when Law Enforcement Forces (LEF) and the Ansar Hezbollah as well as the Basij stormed the dormitories where students had protested peacefully against the closure of the daily "Salam", a pioneer of pro-reform newspapers and publications that mushroomed afterward.

That savage raid triggered an unprecedented wave of students-popular protests and demonstrations against the regime, the first of its kind since the victory of the Islamic Revolution in 1979.

The protest movement lasted five days and was crushed by the Revolutionary Guard, dispatched by Ayatollah Ali Khameneh’i and the blessing of President Mohammad Khatami, who had been elected to the position two years earlier, thanks mostly to the votes of young Iranians, including the students.

But the big difference between the two protest movements, separated by four years was that while the 9 July 1999 night raid was led by Police, in the last one, not only the LEF and the Revolutionary Guards stayed away for most of the time, trying to separate the protesters from the Basij and the Party of God (Hezbollah), but, on certain hot spots, protected the demonstrators, some of them even sympathizing with them.

As a result of the last assault on students, broadcast immediately by Iranian media in the United States, several universities in major cities like Mash-had, Esfahan, Ahvaz and Shiraz erupted in protests against the authorities and clashed with pro-conservatives thugs, repeating slogans heard in Tehran demonstrations, chanting "death to Khameneh'i", "death to Khatami" or "akhoond (cleric) must be killed" etc, promising that the protests would continue until 9 July, the anniversary date of the first open anti-regime rebellion.

In Shiraz, one student was reported killed and "tens" wounded during heavy clashes between protesters and the pressure group, according to various sources and independent media abroad, adding that the demonstrators were expressing their anger against the very person of Khameneh’i for what they described as a "declaration of war".

In a speech pronounced three days ago, Ayatollah Khameneh’i had warned that the protesters, whom he described as "mercenaries working for foreigners, mostly the Americans" would be dealt "mercilessly by faithful forces", meaning the Basij militias and the Party of God, pressures groups controlled by Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, a close aide of the leader and the secretary of the Council of Guardians.

Condemned two years ago to 13 years of imprisonment for "anti-State activities" and contacts with "anti-revolutionary" organizations, including the Monarchists outside, Mr. Mohammadi, who is the leader of the "Iranian Nationalist Students and Alumni Association" explained that if the protest movement has become so violent and so anti-clerical is because the regime has shut all the ways to a democratic dialogue with the people.

His younger brother, Akbar, has been sentenced to 15 years for same kind of charges. Both had been badly tortured, spending almost one year in solitary cells.

As he was talking from Radio Farda, one of the three broadcastings that the authorities have officially banned Iranian journalists and scholars to talk to -- the Voice of America and Radio Israel being the two others --, several students organisations announced the formation of National Committee to coordinate the commemoration of 9 July.

Led by the INSA of Mr. Mohammadi and the "Democratic Front of Iran" in association with several other students organisations, the "9 July National Council", in a statement, called on all Iranian parties and groups inside and outside the country to join the Council.

"Unconditional release from jail of all political prisoners, including students, intellectuals, scholars and journalists, lifting of the ban imposed on more than 100 publications, the arrest and punishment of the killers of Mr. Ezzat Ebrahim Nezhad (the students killed by the thugs on the night of 9 July 1999) holding a national referendum for the people to choose their regime" is among demands that would be formulated on the coming 9 July, a statement by the 9 July Council announced. ENDS STUDENTS UNREST 14603