Protests around Iran over a reduction in state food subsidies have become political, with chants demanding for senior officials to resign, according to social media posts, and at least four demonstrators have been slain, according to unverified reports.
Protests erupted in certain cities last week in response to the government’s decision to reduce subsidies, which resulted in price increases of up to 300 percent for a range of flour-based staples in Iran.
In Iran, where over half of its 85 million people live in poverty, the government has also boosted the prices of several basic necessities such as cooking oil and dairy products.
According to witnesses and social media posts, protestors have broadened their demands, demanding for more political freedom, the end of the Islamic Republic, and the removal of its leaders.
Demonstrators torched photos of Iran’s highest authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and demanded the return of Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran’s deposed Shah.
Protests were seen on Twitter in numerous Iranian provinces, including Ardabil, Khuzestan, Lorestan, and Razavi Khorasan. Meanwhile, several state-affiliated media outlets said that the country’s tranquillity had been restored.
Protests, however, continued early Sunday in at least 40 cities and towns across Iran, including Quchan near the Turkmen border, Rasht in the north, and Hamedan in the west, according to social media footage.
Reuters could not independently confirm the authenticity of social media posts and videos. Iran’s state news agency IRNA said on Friday that some shops were “set on fire in some cities,” prompting police to arrest scores of “provocateurs.”
According to the semi-official ILNA news agency, one demonstrator was murdered in Dezful, a city in the oil-producing southwestern province of Khuzestan, on Saturday. However, videos on Twitter suggested that security personnel murdered at least four people.
Residents of the capital who spoke to Reuters on Sunday reported a large presence of security officers around the city.
NetBlocks, a global Internet monitoring service, reported an hour-long outage in Iran on Saturday due to protests, implying that authorities are attempting to block demonstrators from interacting with one another and sharing footage on social media.
The latest unrest adds to mounting pressure on Iran’s rulers, who are struggling to keep the crippled economy afloat under US sanctions, reimposed since 2018 when Washington ditched Tehran’s 2015 nuclear deal with major powers. Talks to revive the pact have stalled since March.
Fearing a revival of protests in recent years that seemed to shed light on the establishment’s vulnerability to popular anger over the economy, the government has described its decision as “fair redistribution” of subsidies to lower-income people.
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