Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad fired an ominous warning at the country's educated elites on Tuesday by calling for a purge of "liberal and secular" academics in the universities.
In what some analysts interpreted as the start of a clampdown, Ahmadinejad derided secular lecturers as a fifth column of Western colonialism which he said was seeking to expand into Iran.
"Today students should protest and shout at the president asking why some liberal and secular professors are still present in the universities," he told a gathering of young scientists. "Our educational system has been under the influence of the secular system for 150 years. Colonialism is seeking the spread of its own secular system."
While acknowledging it was difficult to change this system, he said: "Such a change has begun."
Ahmadinejad also said his government had tried to reduce the political influence of university chancellors, many of whom were seen as pillars of the reformist government of his predecessor.
"A political predominance existed among many of the university chancellors but we have tried to reduce it because we don't believe chancellors should enter into politics at all," Ahmadinejad said.
The president's salvo recalled previous outbursts against ideological targets, including a call for Israel to be "wiped off the map" and a demand for Western music to be barred from Iran's airwaves.
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