The unrest in Iran, ignited by the death of a young woman in the custody of Iran's morality police, is flaring up across the country for a third week despite government efforts to crack down on it.

On Monday, Iran shuttered its top technology university following an hours-long stand-off between students and the police that turned the prestigious institution into the latest flashpoint of protests and ended with hundreds of young people arrested.

Speaking to a cadre of police students in Tehran, the Ayatollah said he was "Heartbroken" by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in police custody, calling it a "Sad incident".

However, he sharply condemned the protests as a foreign plot to destabilise Iran, echoing authorities' previous comments.

"This rioting was planned," he said.

"These riots and insecurities were designed by America and the Zionist regime and their employees."

Violent crackdowns at universities

Sharif University of Technology in Tehran has announced that only doctoral students will be allowed on campus until further notice following hours of turmoil on Sunday evening, when witnesses say anti-government protesters clashed with hard-line pro-establishment students.

The witnesses, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals, said the police kept hundreds of students holed up on campus and fired rounds of tear gas to disperse the demonstrations.

The university's student association said police and plain-clothes officers surrounded the school from all sides and detained at least 300 students as protests rocked the campus after nightfall.

Plain clothes officers beat a professor and several university employees, the association reported.

The state-run IRNA news agency sought to downplay the violent stand-off, reporting a "protest gathering" took place and ended without casualties.

But the violent crackdown drew condemnation from even the Jomhouri Eslami, a hard-line Iranian newspaper.

"Suppose we beat and arrest, is this the solution?" a column asked. "Suppose that is preventative. But will it be constructive?"

Iran's latest protest movement, which has produced some of the nation's most widespread unrest in years, emerged as a response to Ms Amini's death after her arrest for allegedly violating the country's strict Islamic dress code.

The unrest has grown into an open challenge to the Iranian leadership, with chants of "Death to the dictator" echoing from the streets and balconies after dark.

The demonstrations have tapped into a deep well of grievances in Iran, including over the country's social restrictions, political repression and ailing economy long strangled by American sanctions.

Protests, with women burning their state-mandated headscarves and crowds chanting for the downfall of the ruling clerics, have continued in Tehran and far-flung provinces even as authorities have restricted internet access to the outside world and blocked social media apps.

In his remarks on Monday, the Ayatollah condemned scenes of protesters ripping off their hijabs and setting fire to mosques, banks and police cars as "Actions that are not normal, that are unnatural".

Security forces have responded with tear gas, metal pellets and, in some cases, live fire, according to rights groups and widely shared footage, although the scope of the crackdown remains unclear.

Iran's state TV has reported the death toll from violent clashes between protesters and security officers may be as high as 41.

Rights groups have given higher death counts, with London-based Amnesty International saying it has identified 52 victims, including five women and at least five children.

An untold number of people have been apprehended, with local officials reporting at least 1,500 arrests.

Security forces have picked up artists and activists who have voiced support for the protests, as well as dozens of journalists.

The Ayatollah warned that that those who fomented unrest to "sabotage" the country deserved "harsh prosecution and punishment".

Young people, new strategies:

Most of the protesters appear to be under age of 25, according to witnesses — Iranians who have grown up with global isolation and severe Western sanctions linked to Iran's nuclear program.

Talks to revive the landmark 2015 nuclear deal have stalled for months, fuelling public discontent as Iran's currency has declined in value and prices have soared.

Tehran-based university teacher Shahindokht Kharazmi said the new generation had come up with new and unpredictable ways to defy authorities.

"The [young protesters] have learned the strategy from video games and play to win," Ms Kharazmi told the pro-reform Etemad newspaper. "There is no such thing as defeat for them."

As the new academic year began this week, students gathered in protest at universities across Iran, according to videos widely shared on social media, chanting slogans against the government and denouncing security forces' clampdown on demonstrators.

The eruption of student anger has worried the Islamic Republic since at least 1999, when security forces and supporters of hard-line clerics attacked students protesting against media restrictions.

That wave of student protests under former reformist president Mohammad Khatami kicked off the worst street battles since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

This week, universities in major cities including Isfahan in central Iran, Mashhad in the north-east and Kermanshah in the west have held protests featuring crowds of students clapping, chanting and burning headscarves.

"Don't call it a protest, it's a revolution now," shouted students at Shahid Beheshti University in Tehran, as women waved their hijabs and set them alight, in protest against Iran's law requiring women to cover their hair.

"Students are awake, they hate the leadership!" chanted crowds at the University of Mazandaran in the north.

Police have been out in force, patrolling streets near universities on motorbikes.

Source | AP