According to this person, the security forces use these paint balls to single out protestors, who they believe should be arrested. Sharp shooters are positioned in nearby locations (where they cannot be seen by the demonstrators) and launch paint balls at selected targets,
If anyone else has played Paintball here, sharp-shooting to that sort of needed level of accuracy is pretty much impossible. Just looking at that picture makes me laugh at how a sharp-shooter would "snipe" a select person in that crowd. It's possible to jack up the FPS on a gun to shoot hot (and shoot further), but even then it's not really possible to guarantee a hit, given how a paintball is aerodynamically pitiful compared to an actual bullet.
Anyone else who has played paintball here can confirm that paint can easily fly several feet off its intended trajectory in as short as 40 yards. In a crowd, just 6 inches would be enough to mark the wrong person.
So if they're trying to target a unique person in a crowd who is supposedly going to be arrested? Highly unlikely. I could definitely seem them shooting hot to disperse crowds though, paintballs sting quite nicely without a good layer of clothing.
It's probably almost as effective to hit random people and make them think that they're are being singled out as a ringleader. Bad things happen to political detainees in Iranian jails (http://thesop.org/journalism/2008/02/05/cries-within-iranian...) It would certainly scare the crap out of me to be tagged.
You're not mistaken. Just like the old muskets, the rounds bounce around inside the barrel and are very inaccurate. However, what many people don't know is that prolonged use of a weapon leaves plastic on the inside of the barrel that can induce spin, but the complete opposite of what is desired in a rifled barrel.
I've seen paint balls consistently fly several feet wide over a 25-50 foot distance. If these 'snipers' don't have a rifled barrel (highly doubtful), they have the potential to miss every single one of their targets during an average protest (like 3+ hours), and these protests are apparently going on all day. If these snipers are staying hidden, they're obviously not going to be interested in changing weapons or barrels.
If anyone else has played Paintball here, sharp-shooting to that sort of needed level of accuracy is pretty much impossible. Just looking at that picture makes me laugh at how a sharp-shooter would "snipe" a select person in that crowd. It's possible to jack up the FPS on a gun to shoot hot (and shoot further), but even then it's not really possible to guarantee a hit, given how a paintball is aerodynamically pitiful compared to an actual bullet.
Anyone else who has played paintball here can confirm that paint can easily fly several feet off its intended trajectory in as short as 40 yards. In a crowd, just 6 inches would be enough to mark the wrong person.
So if they're trying to target a unique person in a crowd who is supposedly going to be arrested? Highly unlikely. I could definitely seem them shooting hot to disperse crowds though, paintballs sting quite nicely without a good layer of clothing.