Iran
protesters tell of brutal police response as regime lashes out
Videos
emerging despite internet and mobile phone blackout show demonstrations
continuing despite reports of escalating crackdown
William
Christou and Deepa Parent
Sun 11
Jan 2026 07.00 GMT
Demonstrators
have continued to take to the streets of Iran, defying an escalating crackdown
by authorities against the growing protest movement.
An
internet shutdown imposed by the authorities on Thursday has largely cut the
protesters off from the rest of the world, but videos that trickled out of the
country showed thousands of people demonstrating in Tehran overnight into
Saturday morning. They chanted: “Death to Khamenei,” in reference to supreme
leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and: “Long live the shah.”
New
protests broke out late on Saturday with people rallying in a northern district
of Tehran, according to a video verified by AFP.
Fireworks
were set off over Tehran’s Punak Square as demonstrators banged pots and
shouted slogans in support of the Pahlavi rulers ousted after the 1979 Islamic
revolution, the video showed.
Crowds of
protesters also marched through the streets of Mashhad as fires burned around
them, a show of defiance in the home town of Khamenei, who has condemned the
protesters as “vandals” and blamed the US for fanning the flames of dissent.
More than
570 protests have taken place across all of Iran’s 31 provinces, the US-based
Human Rights Activists News Agency reported early Sunday.
Donald
Trump has repeatedly threatened to intervene if Iranian authorities kill
protesters, earning angry rebukes from Tehran. He said on Friday that the
Iranian authorities were “in big trouble”, adding: “You better not start
shooting, because we’ll start shooting too.”
On
Saturday night he said the US is “ready to help” as protesters in Iran faced an
intensifying crackdown by authorities of the Islamic republic.
“Iran is
looking at FREEDOM, perhaps like never before. The USA stands ready to help!!!”
Trump said in a social post on Truth Social, without elaborating.
Iran’s
parliament speaker on Sunday warned that the US military and Israel will be
“legitimate targets” if America strikes the Islamic Republic, as threatened by
president Donald Trump.
The
comments by Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf represent the first to add Israel into the
mix of possible targets for an Iranian strike.
Qalibaf,
a hard-liner, made the threat as lawmakers rushed the dais in the Iranian
parliament, shouting: “Death to America!”
Authorities
warned people to not take part in protests on Saturday. The country’s attorney
general, Mohammad Mahvadi Azad, said anyone who did so would be considered an
“enemy of god”, a charge which carries the death penalty. State TV later
clarified that anyone who even assisted protesters could face the charge.
Despite
the crackdown, more protests were planned for the weekend. Reza Pahlavi, the
exiled son of the former shah of Iran, called for protesters to take to the
streets on Saturday and Sunday and seize control of their towns. Pahlavi, who
has emerged as an increasingly popular figure in the current round of protests,
asked people to hoist the pre-1979 “lion and sun” flag that was used during his
father’s rule.
“Our goal
is no longer merely to come into the streets. The goal is to prepare to seize
city centres and hold them,” he said, promising he would return to Iran soon.
The
continuing block on the internet and mobile networks means it is hard for
international media to estimate the size of the demonstrations, the largest in
Iran in recent years, which pose a serious challenge to the regime’s rule.
But the
few videos coming out of the country, as well as activists who managed to evade
the blackout via the Starlink satellite system, spoke of angry protesters and a
heavy-handed police response.
“We’re
standing up for a revolution, but we need help. Snipers have been stationed
behind the Tajrish Arg area [a wealthy neighbourhood in Tehran],” a protester
in Tehran told the Guardian via sporadic text messages sent via Starlink. The
protester said many people had been shot at across the city, adding: “We saw
hundreds of bodies.”
The
Guardian was not able to independently verify the protesters’ claims and human
rights activists have also said verification of reported human rights
violations is difficult.
However,
another activist in Tehran told the Guardian they had witnessed security forces
firing live ammunition at protesters and saw a “very high” number killed, while
human rights activists said the claims of police brutality were consistent with
testimony they had been given.
The
US-based Human Rights Activist news agency has said that at least 116 people
had been killed in the violence surrounding the protests and more than 2,600
others detained. Rights groups and Iranian authorities have also documented
casualties among security forces, which the latter blame on foreign-backed
saboteurs.
The
Iranian Nobel peace prize-winner Shirin Ebadi warned on Friday that security
forces could be preparing to commit a “massacre under the cover of a sweeping
communications blackout”, and said she had already received reports of hundreds
of people being treated for eye injuries at a single Tehran hospital.
Protesters
were brought to the streets on 28 December by a deteriorating economy, but
quickly began chanting anti-government slogans and demanding political reform.
Though
Iran has experienced mass protests before, analysts have said the battering of
the regime during the 12-day war with Israel and the loss of Iranian-backed
forces across the region have made it more vulnerable.
Iranian
authorities have become increasingly confrontational in their rhetoric towards
protesters, casting them as being infiltrated and backed by Israeli, or US
saboteurs. The Iranian army vowed in a statement on Saturday to foil “the
enemy’s plots”, warning that undermining the country’s security was a “red
line”.
State TV
tried to portray an air of normality as protests continued, describing them as
small aberrations from an otherwise peaceful country. A state television anchor
warned protesters not to go out, telling parents to stop their children from
demonstrating. “If something happens, if someone is injured, if a bullet is
fired and something happens to them, do not complain,” they said.
The
international community has rallied around the protesters, with EU states and
the US posting messages of support. “The United States supports the brave
people of Iran,” Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, said on X on Saturday.
Iranian
authorities have tried a carrot-and-stick approach, distinguishing between what
they called “legitimate” protesters expressing economic grievances and
“rioters” backed by foreign powers trying to destablise Iran. The government
has said it is engaging in dialogue with the former, but human rights groups
have described increasing generalised violence directed at protesters at the
hands of security officials.
A video
verified by Iran Human Rights group showed distressed family members looking
through a pile of bodies in Ghadir hospital in Tehran on Thursday. The rights
group said that the bodies were of protesters killed by authorities.
Fars news
agency, a news agency close to the Iranian security services, aired video of
what appeared to be forced confessions of protesters. Human rights activists
warned that forced confessions, while in themselves a human rights violation,
were often used as evidence for executions in Iran.
The
continuing internet blackout made documenting both the momentum of protests and
the violations committed against demonstrators difficult, and activists were
trying to create workarounds. They implored media to continue covering the
situation in Iran as they described worsening brutality.
“Please
make sure to state clearly that they are killing people with live ammunition,”
an Iranian activist said.
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário