Twenty policemen, including former
Tehran police chief, Brigadier General Farhad Nazari, are to stand trial for their role in a raid on a student hostel last July, the official Iranian news agency has reported. Several students were killed in the raid, and subsequent protests led to the arrest of at least 1,400 students, many of whom claimed that they had been forced to sign confessions. The announcement of the trials of the policemen coincides with attempts by President Khatami to rein in
the police in the run-up to elections this month.