Administrative Justice Court Rejects Appeal Against Expulsion of Sahara Rezaei, Journalism Student

The lawyer of Sahara Rezaei, a seventh-term expelled journalism student, announced that the Administrative Justice Court has rejected the appeal against this student's expulsion. On Friday, September 9, Rezaei's lawyer, Reza Shafakhah, wrote on 'X' that the expulsion order for this Afghan student from Allameh Tabatabai University was issued following the nationwide protests of 'Women, Life, Freedom' in 2022. The lack of cooperation from the Administrative Justice Court for the return of Sahara Rezaei to the university coincides with claims by Masoud Pezeshkian regarding the groundwork for the reinstatement of expelled professors and students. Masoud Pezeshkian, the head of the 14th government of the Islamic Republic and one of the officials responsible for the 'cleansing' of universities after the 1979 revolution, called on Thursday, September 8, for a review of the status of expelled professors and students to facilitate their return. Reza Shafakhah described Pezeshkian's remarks as 'very nice' and requested that the case of Sahara Rezaei, who has studied journalism for seven terms with the help of benefactors, be reconsidered. Sahara Rezaei was arrested on October 18, 2022, during the nationwide protests of 'Women, Life, Freedom' and was released after about two months of being unaccounted for. Recently, Mahmoud Momtazpour, a professor at Amir Kabir University and a supporter of the protesters, was also expelled from this university. Reyhaneh Ebrahimi Vandi, a counseling student at Alzahra University, Yekta Mirzaei, a sociology student at Tehran University, and Kian Bani Hashemi, a master's student in organizational behavior management at Tehran University, are among the students who have recently been sentenced to educational deprivation. Following the nationwide protests of 'Women, Life, Freedom' in 2022, pressure on students and the repression and harassment of them, especially female students, intensified. Many students were arrested or suspended from their studies, and professors who supported them faced similar fates. The contradiction in Pezeshkian's actions and statements regarding the reinstatement of expelled professors; Mahmoud Momtazpour was expelled from Amir Kabir University. Pezeshkian's request for a review of the expulsion of professors and students and his silence regarding the dismissal of hundreds of teachers. The disciplinary committee of Alzahra and Tehran universities sentenced two female students to educational deprivation. Security charges against a teachers' union activist; Ismail Abdi is on the verge of being expelled from the Ministry of Education.