(Reuters) – The commander-in-chief of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards has warned people not to demonstrate, saying Saturday will be “the last day of riots” in a move that may signal authorities’ desire to crack down further.
“Don’t take to the streets! Today is the last day of the riots,” said General Hossein Salami.
Demonstrations against power have multiplied in recent weeks in Iran after the death in custody in mid-September of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman arrested for wearing a veil deemed illegal.
This protest movement, which has spread to all layers of Iranian society, is considered one of the most serious challenges to theocratic power in Tehran since the Islamic revolution of 1979.
The authorities have repeatedly implicated foreign countries considered enemies, starting with the United States and Israel.
“This sinister project hatched (…) in the White House and within the Zionist regime,” added Hossein Salami.
The Revolutionary Guards, an elite corps under the direct authority of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, has not been deployed since the protests began on September 16.
According to human rights associations, at least 250 demonstrators were killed and several thousand others arrested throughout the country.
TRIAL IN TEHRAN
The NGO Hengaw said security forces fired on students at a girls’ school in Saqez, in the northwest, on Saturday, as well as students at the Kurdistan Medical University in Sanandaj, capital of the province of Kurdistan, also in the North-West.
Several students were injured, including one by a bullet to the head, Hengaw added, information that Reuters could not verify.
According to videos posted on social networks, protest rallies took place in several universities in the country including those of Kerman, Mashhad, Qazvin, Ahva, Arak, Kermanshah and a dozen campuses in Tehran.
At the same time, the trial of 315 demonstrators opened in the Iranian capital, reports the official news agency Irna. At least five defendants are being prosecuted for offenses punishable by death.
Images posted on social media on Friday showed protesters calling for the death of Ali Khamenei, and members of the Bassidji militia, a volunteer paramilitary organization that has played an important role in the crackdown in recent weeks.
The Ministry of Intelligence and the intelligence service of the Revolutionary Guards accuse the American, British, Israeli and Saudi services of having orchestrated the unrest to destabilize the Islamic Republic.
Hossein Salami, who was speaking at the funeral of victims of an attack committed this week and claimed by the Islamic State organization, relayed these accusations by addressing the demonstrators directly.
“Don’t sell your honor to America and punch the security forces in the face who are defending you,” he said.
(Dubai office report, French version Marc Angrand and Jean-Stéphane Brosse)