By Parisa Hafezi
Jan 18 (Reuters) – Iran’s president warned on Sunday that any U.S. strike would trigger a “fierce response” from Tehran after an Iranian official in the region said at least 5,000 people — including about 500 security personnel — had been killed in protests across the country.
Iran’s protests, which erupted last month in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar over economic grievances, quickly turned political and spread across the country, drawing participants from across generations and income groups – businessmen, students, men and women, poor and rich – calling for an end to clerical rule.
American President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to intervene if the protesters continued to be killed in the streets or executed. He said in an interview with Politico on Saturday: “it is time to look for new leadership in Iran”.
Iran signaled on Sunday that it may go ahead with executing people detained during the unrest, and with its clerical rulers facing mounting international pressure over the bloodiest unrest since the 1979 Islamic revolution, is seeking to deter Trump from getting involved.
Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian on X warned that Tehran’s response “to any unjust aggression will be harsh and regrettable”, adding that any attack on the country’s supreme leader is “meaning to a full-scale war against the nation”.
REPORTS OF THE RIGHTS GROUP 24,000 AREST
The protests subsided last week after a violent crackdown.
The US-based rights group HRANA said on Saturday that the death toll had reached 3,308, with another 4,382 cases under review. She said she confirmed more than 24,000 arrests.
On Friday, Trump thanked Tehran’s leaders in a social media post, saying they had halted the scheduled executions of 800 people. He moved US military assets to the region but did not specify what he might do.
A day later, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei branded Trump a “criminal”, and acknowledged “several thousands of deaths” he blamed on “terrorists and rioters” linked to the United States and Israel.
Iran’s judiciary has indicated that the executions may go ahead.
“A series of actions have been identified as Mohareb, which is among the most severe Islamic punishments,” Iranian judiciary spokesman Asghar Jahangir said at a press conference on Sunday.
Mohareb, an Islamic legal term meaning to wage war against God, is punishable by death under Iranian law.
The Iranian official told Reuters the verified death toll was likely to “increase drastically”, adding that “Israel and armed groups abroad” supported and equipped those taking to the streets.
The clerical establishment regularly blames the unrest on foreign enemies, including the United States and Israel, a key enemy of the Islamic Republic which launched military strikes in June.
The internet outage was partially lifted for a few hours on Saturday but internet monitoring group NetBlocks said they later resumed.
One Tehran resident said that last week he saw riot police shooting directly at a group of protesters, mostly young men and women. Videos circulating on social media, some of which were verified by Reuters, showed security forces cracking down on demonstrations across the country.
THE HIGHEST EVER OF DEATHS IN THE KURDISH AREAS
The Iranian official, who declined to be named because of the sensitivity of the issue, also said that some of the biggest fighting and the highest number of deaths were in the Iranian Kurdish areas in the northwest of the country.
Kurdish separatists have been active there and flare-ups have been among the most violent in past periods of unrest.
Three sources told Reuters on January 14 that armed Kurdish separatist groups tried to cross the border into Iran from Iraq in a sign of foreign entities potentially seeking to take advantage of the instability.
Faizan Ali, a 40-year-old doctor from Lahore, said he had to cut short his trip to Iran to visit his Iranian wife in the central city of Isfahan as “there was no internet or communication with my family in Pakistan”.
“I saw a violent mob burning buildings, banks and cars. I also saw an individual stab a passerby,” he told Reuters upon his arrival back in Lahore.
(Additional reporting by Mubasher Bukhari in Lahore, Writing by Parisa Hafezi, Editing by Alexander Smith and Philippa Fletcher)