Deaths from Iran protests reach more than 500, rights group says

DUBAI/JERUSALEM - Unrest in Iran has killed more than 500 people, a rights group said on Jan 11, as Tehran threatened to target US military bases
if President Donald Trump carries out threats to intervene on behalf of protesters.

With the Islamic Republic’s clerical establishment facing the biggest demonstrations since 2022, Mr Trump has repeatedly threatened to intervene if force is used on protesters.

According to its latest figures – from activists inside and outside Iran – US-based rights group HRANA said it had verified the deaths of 490 protesters and 48 security personnel, with more than 10,600 people arrested.

Iran has not given an official toll and Reuters was unable to independently verify the tolls.

Mr Trump was to meet senior advisers
on Jan 13 to discuss options for Iran, a US official told Reuters on Jan 11.

The Wall Street Journal had reported that options included military strikes, using secret cyber weapons, widening sanctions and providing online help to anti-government sources.

“The military is looking at it, and we’re looking at some very strong options,” Mr Trump told reporters travelling on Air Force One on the night of Jan 11.

Mr Trump said he was in contact with Iranian opposition leaders.

He also said, without elaborating, that Iran’s leaders had called him on Jan 10 and want to negotiate, and that he might talk to them.

Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, speaking in Parliament on Jan 11, warned the United States against “a miscalculation”.

“Let us be clear: In the case of an attack on Iran, the occupied territories (Israel) as well as all US bases and ships will be our legitimate target,” said Mr Qalibaf, a former commander in Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards.

Authorities intensify crackdown

The protests began on Dec 28 in response to soaring prices, before turning against the clerical rulers who have governed since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

The authorities accuse the US and Israel of fomenting trouble and called for a nationwide rally on Jan 12 to condemn “terrorist actions led by the United States and Israel” in Iran, state media reported.

The flow of information from Iran has been hampered by an internet blackout
since Jan 8.

Mr Trump said on Jan 11 that he would talk to billionaire Elon Musk about restoring internet access in Iran through his Starlink satellite service.

Footage posted on social media on Jan 10 from Tehran showed large crowds marching along a street at night, clapping and chanting. The crowd “has no end nor beginning”, a man is heard saying.

In footage from the north-eastern city of Mashhad, smoke can be seen billowing into the night sky from fires in the street. Another video posted on Jan 10 showed masked protesters and a road strewn with debris. Explosions could also be heard.

Reuters verified the locations.

State TV showed dozens of body bags on the ground at the Tehran coroner’s office, saying the dead were victims of events caused by “armed terrorists”, as well as footage of loved ones gathered outside the Kahrizak Forensic Medical Centre in Tehran waiting to identify bodies.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he was shocked by reports of violence by the Iranian authorities and urged maximum restraint.

“The rights to freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly must be fully respected and protected,” he said on social media platform X.

The authorities on Jan 11 declared three days of national mourning “in honour of martyrs killed in resistance against the United States and the Zionist regime”, according to state media.

Israel and Iran fought a 12-day war in June in 2025, which the United States briefly joined by attacking key nuclear installations. Iran retaliated by firing missiles at Israel and an American air base in Qatar.

Iran denounces ‘rioters and terrorists’

While the Iranian authorities have weathered previous protests, the latest have unfolded with Tehran still recovering from the 2025 war and with its regional position weakened by blows to allies such as Lebanon’s Hezbollah
since the Oct 7, 2023, Hamas-led attacks against Israel.

Iran’s unrest comes as Mr Trump flexes US muscles on the world stage, having ousted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro
, and floating the possibility of acquiring Greenland by purchase or military force.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, in a TV interview, said Israel and the US were masterminding destabilisation and that Iran’s enemies had brought in “terrorists... who set mosques on fire... attack banks and public properties”.

“Families, I ask you: Do not allow your young children to join rioters and terrorists who behead people and kill others,” he said, adding that the government was ready to listen to the people and to resolve the economic problems.

Iran summoned Britain’s ambassador on Jan 11 to the Foreign Ministry in Tehran over “interventionist comments” attributed to the British foreign minister and a protester removing the Iranian flag from the London Embassy building and replacing it with a style of flag that was used prior to the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Britain’s Foreign Office did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Mr Alan Eyre, a former US diplomat and Iran expert, thought it unlikely the protests would topple Iran’s ruling establishment.

“I think it more likely that it puts these protests down eventually, but emerges from the process far weaker,” he told Reuters, noting that Iran’s ruling elite still appeared cohesive and there was no organised opposition.

Iranian state TV broadcast funeral processions in western cities such as Gachsaran and Yasuj for security personnel killed in protests.

State TV said 30 members of the security forces would be buried in the central city of Isfahan and that six more were killed by “rioters” in Kermanshah in the west.

US ready to help, says Trump

Mr Trump, posting on social media on Jan 10, said: “Iran is looking at FREEDOM, perhaps like never before. The USA stands ready to help!!!”

In a phone call on Jan 10, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio discussed the possibility of US intervention in Iran
, according to an Israeli source present for the conversation.

Some protesters in the United States took to the streets in support of the demonstrators in Iran.

In the Los Angeles neighbourhood of Westwood, a rental truck drove into a crowd of a few hundred people who were holding a rally in support of the Iranian protesters, KNBC news outlet reported on Jan 11.

Based on video news accounts, Los Angeles Police officer Sean Murray said the driver was escorted away by police.

The officer said it was not clear how many people were injured, but that all of the injured were treated at the scene.

Mr Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran’s last shah and a prominent voice in the fragmented opposition, said Mr Trump had observed Iranians’ “indescribable bravery”. “Do not abandon the streets,” Mr Pahlavi, who is based in the US, wrote on X. REUTERS