Iran’s students are looking for clever new ways to keep their campaign for democracy going. But it is a struggle. Nearly all foreign journalists, bar a handful of agency reporters, are being kept out, so that channel of communication is barred. Websites such as those of the BBC and Facebook are blocked. The text-message system has been stop-go. The authorities have randomly declared public holidays and told people to stay off the streets because of “unhealthy pollution levels”. Security men in plain clothes stop people, especially young ones, at crossroads, to check their bags and identities…The authorities have closed down Tehran’s main university…Graffiti praising Mir Hosein Mousavi,… have been scrubbed off, leaving a huge officially sanctioned mural depicting the Statue of Liberty hurling rocks at cowering women and children. Other centres of learning in Tehran, such as Amirkabir University of Technology and Sharif University, have also been locked down.
