The turmoil driven by severe economic hardships has emerged as the most significant internal challenge to Iran’s leadership in over three years. This unrest coincides with mounting international tensions following Israeli and US military actions last year.
For the first time, an Iranian official has disclosed that approximately 2,000 individuals have lost their lives in the protests that have swept across the nation for more than two weeks. However, the official did not provide a detailed breakdown of these figures.
According to the US-based human rights organization HRANA, of the 2,003 confirmed fatalities, 1,850 were participants in the protests.
The group further reported that 16,784 individuals have been detained, marking a significant increase from their previous count earlier in the week.
On Monday night, President Trump announced a 25% import tariff on goods from any nation conducting business with Iran, a significant oil supplier. He also mentioned that additional military measures are among the potential responses he is considering in reaction to Iran’s crackdown on the protests.
While Tehran has yet to publicly address Trump’s tariff announcement, China quickly condemned the move. Iran, already under stringent US sanctions, primarily exports its oil to China, alongside other key trading partners like Turkey, Iraq, the United Arab Emirates, and India.
Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araqchi said on Monday he had continued to communicate with US special envoy Steve Witkoff during the protests and that Tehran was studying ideas proposed by Washington.
Russia condemns ‘subversive external interference’
Iranian authorities have accused the US and Israel of fomenting the unrest.
Russia on Tuesday condemned what it described as “subversive external interference” in Iran’s internal politics, saying any repeat of last year’s US strikes would have “disastrous consequences” for the Middle East and international security.
Despite the protests, the economic strains, and years of external pressure, there are as yet no signs of fracture in the security elite that could bring down the clerical system in power since a 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Britain, France, Germany and Italy all summoned Iranian ambassadors in protest over the crackdown.
“The brutal actions of the Iranian regime against its own people are shocking,” the German Foreign Ministry said on social media platform X.
Underscoring international uncertainty over what comes next in Iran, which has been one of the dominant powers across the Middle East for decades, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he believed the government would fall.
“I assume that we are now witnessing the final days and weeks of this regime,” he said, adding that if it had to maintain power through violence, “it is effectively at its end”.
He did not expand on whether this forecast was based on intelligence or other assessments.
Araqchi dismissed Merz’s criticisms, accusing Berlin of double standards and saying he had “obliterated any shred of credibility”.
Rights group says man accused in protest set to be executed
The protests began on December 28 over the fall in value of the currency and have grown into wider demonstrations and calls for the fall of the clerical establishment.
Iran’s authorities have taken a dual approach, cracking down while also calling protests over economic problems legitimate.
Hengaw, an Iranian Kurdish rights group, has reported that a 26-year-old man, Erfan Soltani, arrested in connection with protests in the city of Karaj, will be executed on Wednesday. Authorities had told the family that the death sentence was final, Hengaw reported, citing a source close to the family.
Reuters could not independently confirm the report. State media has not reported any death sentences so far.
The head of Iran’s judiciary has said specialied courts have been appointed to deal with protests.
Parliament member Mohammadreza Sabaghian, who represents an area in Yazd, in central Iran, said the government needed to resolve people’s dissatisfaction, otherwise “the same events will occur with greater intensity”.
Communications restrictions including an internet blackout have hampered the flow of information. The UN rights office said phone services had been restored but internet links with Iran remained patchy.
The Iranian Intelligence Ministry said it had confiscated electronic devices intended to be used in the protests, according to a statement carried by state media.
Hengaw reported that authorities had started to confiscate communications devices from households in several cities.
