Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s Student Day speech was interrupted by students chanting in supporting of Iran’s 2009 Green Movement leaders. While Rouhani handled the chants well and attempted to spin them in his favor, his administration faced accusations of cancelling the speeches of conservative figures at other universities.
Student Day in Iran is the anniversary of the 1953 murder of three University of Tehran students under the government of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. While the day has held various meanings over the years, in the last couple, the day has been mostly used by students to express support for student activists and for Green Movement leaders Mir Hussein Mousavi, his wife Zahra Rahnavard and Mehdi Karroubi, who have been under house arrest for nearly four years.
