Iraqi students say arrested for wearing jeansBy Khaled Farhan Fri Jun 24,12:52 PM ET
NAJAF, Iraq (Reuters) - Students in the Shi'ite Muslim religious Iraqi city of Najaf said that police recently arrested and beat several of them for wearing jeans and having long hair.
"They arrested us because of our hair and because we were wearing jeans," said student Mohammed Jasim, adding that the arrests took place two weeks ago in the city, the spiritual heart of Iraq's newly dominant Shi'ite majority.
"They beat us in front of the people. Then they took us to their headquarters, beat us again, shaved our heads and tore our clothes.
"When we asked what we had done, they said that we had no honor," he told Reuters this week.
Police in Najaf, a conservative city that some residents say has grown more so since Saddam Hussein was overthrown two years ago and religious Shi'ites gained greater power in Iraq, disputed the students' version of events.
"We didn't oppress any freedoms. We detained them for a while and after we knew that they were students, we released them after they pledged they wouldn't do it again," Colonel Najah Yasir told Reuters.
Yasir commands the Tho Alfakar Brigade, a unit whose name refers to Imam Ali, son-in-law of Islam's Prophet Mohammad, whose shrine is the centerpiece of Najaf.
Yasir said the brigade had received complaints from locals in the old part of Najaf that young men were gathering in the streets and acting "improperly."
He declined to elaborate on their "improper acts."
Earlier this week, Najaf's Youth Association delivered a statement to political parties denouncing the arrests and calling them a violation of rights.
Najaf, 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad, is holy to Shi'ites and home to many religious scholars, some of whom have a growing political role as spiritual leaders of the community that was oppressed under Saddam.
Throughout the Shi'ite south of Iraq over the past two years, alcohol salesmen and others deemed to trade in goods that violate Islam have been harassed by militants.
But it is not only in Shi'ite areas that religion plays an increasingly influential role in society.
In Falluja, a Sunni Muslim city west of Baghdad that was until recently a stronghold of insurgents, there were efforts last year to instill a strict religious code similar to that enforced by the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Several residents said they were beaten for violating it.
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