Iranian authorities as well as reformers are gearing up for tomorrow's marches and demonstrations in Iran according to buzz building on social media websites such as Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and YouTube.
Anti-riot police and revolutionary prosecutors are threatening reformers and activists. The state-run Islamic Republic News Agency warned that all rallies but official are outlawed Wednesday.
As Reuters
reports, the warning statement said:
We are announcing that only anti-American rallies in front of the former American embassy in Tehran are legal. Other gatherings or rallies on Wednesday are illegal and will be strongly confronted by the police.
All Iranian media are only allowed to cover official event outside the former U.S. embassy.
A number of Iranian social activists, students and members of non-government organizations – mostly from the One Million Signature Campaign for Gender Equality – have been called to the revolutionary prosecutor’s office, the independent Iranian daily,
Rooz reports. As one of the summoned people said:
The summons were for the purpose of intimidating and scaring the victims on the eve of the November 4th demonstrations with the purpose of dissuading them from participating in the event.
Yesterday, according to
Reuters, a member of one of the rebel group was executed. Abdolhamid Rigi from an illegal organization called Jundollah Sunni was hanged in a prison in the city of Zahedan.
Despite threats, Iranian activists and students seem to be determined to go to the streets. The main sources of news about their activity are now social media websites: Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube. Social networks are filling with pictures and videos from recent events as well as statements meant to mobilize their compatriots to take a part in tomorrow's demonstrations. They inform each other about important obstacles, like: "UltraSurf & Yahoo messenger stopped working in Tehran." They ask journalists from other media, also mainstream, to cover tomorrow's "Green Tsunami on Tehran."
Some other websites already launched live-blogging coverage based on information from Twitter. Coverage can be found on Enduring America (
The Latest from Iran), and on Crowdable (
Protesting for Iran).
