Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on Friday rebuffed a promise by US leader Joe Biden to “liberate” Iran as the clerical regime faced a fresh wave of protests seven weeks after the anti-regime movement began.
The protests began after the death of Mahsa Amini, who was arrested by the vice squad. Due to their scale, their nationwide spread and their anti-regime character, the demonstrations have become the greatest challenge from the streets to the authorities since the 1979 revolution.
During the campaign for the US midterm elections, Biden said: “Don’t worry, we will liberate Iran. They will free themselves pretty soon.”
But Raisi responded by saying, “The great people of Iran will not bow their heads to you.”
“Our men and women – our young men and young women are determined and we will never allow you to carry out your satanic desires,” he said at a gathering commemorating the November 1979 student takeover of the US Embassy in Tehran.
“The enemy today is targeting our solidarity and national unity, our security, our peace and our resolve,” Raisi said.
– “Radicalization of protests” –
Troubles for the Iranian system under Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, 83, are compounded by a tradition of holding mourning ceremonies 40 days after a death — known as “chehelom” — meaning any death can spark new protests six weeks later .
One of the largest protests took place in the city of Karaj outside Tehran on Thursday, where protesters marked the death of Hadis Najafi, 22, in September.
Images on social media showed a long line of protesters marching down a highway and then clashed with security forces, who responded with live fire.
Several protesters themselves attacked police, according to images released by the 1500tasvir monitor, with a police patrol post set on fire and stones hurled at a car in which blood-splattered officers were trapped.
According to state media, a member of Iran’s paramilitary Basij force and two other unidentified people were killed and ten police officers and a cleric injured in clashes in Karaj on Thursday.
There was no immediate evidence of casualties among the protesters. Some on social media expressed unease about their tactics.
“The Islamic Republic is responsible for the radicalization of protests and the violent repression of protesters,” said Saeid Golkar, an assistant professor at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.
“People are only reacting to the brutal repression of the state,” he told the AFP news agency.
Many people also shouted anti-government slogans at a memorial rally for protester Mahsa Mugoi in Fouladshahr outside the city of Isfahan, 1500tasvir said.
Pictures from the northern city of Tabriz showed protesters chasing away security forces.
The state has responded to the unprecedented wave of protests with what activists call a crackdown. According to an updated death toll released Wednesday by Norway-based Iran Human Rights, 176 people were killed as security forces responded to protests sparked by Amini’s death.
Another 101 people were killed in a widespread protest wave in Zahedan in the south-eastern province of Sistan-Balochistan.
– mass arrests –
So far, 1,000 people have been charged in the arrests, and activists say they could face the death penalty.
According to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), 54 journalists have been arrested and a dozen have been released on bail so far.
The latest confirmed arrest is Nazila Maroufian, a Tehran-based journalist from Amini’s hometown of Saqez in Kurdistan province, who was arrested on Sunday, Norway-based rights group Hengaw said on Friday.
Despite warnings from the authorities, she published an interview with Amini’s father, the journalist wrote on Twitter before her arrest.
According to Hengaw, Saman Yasin, a singer from the Kurdish-populated city of Kermanshah in western Iran, has now been charged with “waging war against God”.
The singer, who was arrested in October, faces the death penalty for Moharebeh, the indictment based on Sharia law that is often leveled against opponents of the regime in Iran. Hengaw said he supported the protests in song and on social media.
Activists have also condemned as a forced confession a video released by Iran’s state media of Toomaj Salehi, a prominent rapper who was arrested over the weekend after supporting the protests.
The video shows a blindfolded man posing as Salehi and admitting he made “a mistake”.
There are also growing concerns about the well-being of Wall Street Journal contributor and freedom of expression activist Hossein Ronaghi, who was arrested in September.
According to his family, he is on a hunger strike with two broken legs.
