Iranian students and parents say the government has placed 12th-grade final exam centers on or beside
By Bernard Moerdler,
Iranian students and parents say the government has placed 12th-grade final exam centers on or beside military sites, and some students are refusing to attend, according to messages aired by Iran International. Students described exam halls next to IRGC and Basij bases, an airfield, and the Ministry of Intelligence. "All the kids' exam centers have been placed next to a base or an airfield or a military site," one wrote. "However much we protest, they tell us it is safe. How is any of it safe?" Another, describing a center placed beside the IRGC with the intelligence ministry behind it, wrote, "I am not going to sit that exam, because my life matters more, and no one else should either." One parent wrote that their daughter's assigned exam hall turned out to sit next to Basij and IRGC bases.
BNN geolocated the named centers against satellite imagery and known IRGC and Iranian Army positions. One resolves at the Fordow nuclear complex near Qom, the fortified enrichment site the United States has struck before. Three more sit on or immediately beside a military installation: a walled IRGC compound in Tehran's District 13, the Valiasr (Eshratabad) IRGC garrison, and the Shahid Boroonsi (Imam Reza IRGC) barracks in Mashhad. A fifth, in Pakdasht, sits in the Shahid Namju area next to the Parchin military complex, and a sixth, in Firuzabad, sits across the road from the district police and security command.
Iranian military sites have come under renewed US strikes since the ceasefire collapsed on 8 July, placing students at the geolocated centers within the danger radius. "Let the whole world know that if something happens to us, this regime should not exploit our blood or pin it on Israel and America," one graduate student wrote, among several who said they would not sit their exams. Under international humanitarian law, schools are protected unless they are used for military purposes, and using civilians to shield military objectives is prohibited. Tehran denies using civilians as shields.
Topics: Iran, Diplomacy
Reported by Bernard Moerdler for Bernie News Network. See our editorial standards and corrections policy.