Iran slows internet access before protests

AP

INTERNET USAGE SLOWED: Mobile phone and internet connections have been deliberately slowed down in Iran, ahead of suspected protests.

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In another familiar tactic before such rallies, authorities have ordered journalists working for foreign media organisations not to leave their offices to cover the demonstrations.

Iran's beleaguered opposition has sought to maintain momentum with periodic demonstrations coinciding with state-sanctioned events. Monday's rallies will take place on a day that normally marks a 1953 killing of three students at an anti-US protest. Since the 1990s, the day has served as an occasion for pro-reform protests.

Students are at the centre of the opposition to Iran's clerical regime and its brutal crackdown on demonstrators, protesting what they believed was a fraudulent presidential election in June.

The opposition, which relies on the web and mobile phone service to organise rallies and get its message out, has vowed to hold rallies on Monday, the first anti-government show of force in a month.

It was not clear if the demonstrations would take place on university campuses or in the streets, but there was a visible increase in the number of police and other security personnel around Tehran University on Sunday.

The call went out on dozens of websites run by supporters of opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mahdi Karroubi, both of whom ran in the June 12 election. Most of those sites have been repeatedly blocked by the government, forcing activists to set up new ones.

Internet connections in the capital, Tehran, have been slow or completely down since Saturday. Blocking internet access and mobile phone service has been one of the routine methods employed by the authorities to undermine the opposition in recent months.

The government has not publicly acknowledged it is behind the outages, but Iran's internet service providers say the problem is not on their end and is not a technical glitch. A day or two after the demonstrations, mobile phone and internet service is restored.

Former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who has been a powerful voice of dissent from within the ranks of the Islamic leadership, accused Iran's hard-line rulers, in comments reported on Sunday, of silencing any constructive criticism.

"The situation in the country is such that constructive criticism is not tolerated," Rafsanjani was quoted by several news agencies as saying.

Throughout Iran's postelection crisis, Rafsanjani has appeared to side with critics alleging that the vote was rigged.

Signs have mounted in recent days of a potentially explosive confrontation on Monday, especially if student protesters dare to take their demonstrations off campuses.

Iran's police chief, Gen Ismail Ahmadi Moghaddam, warned that security forces will crush any protests on Monday.

"If any unauthorised gatherings take place outside the universities, police will confront them," Moghaddam was quoted as saying by the semi-official Fars news agency.

- AP