Iran's riot police brace for wider protests

The commander of the Iranian Police special units says his force is expanding its capabilities in preparation for tackling fresh protests.

General Hassan Karami told Entekhab News on March 25, that the special forces are preparing to simultaneously confront unrest at 400 locations.

The protests that started in September 2022 raged in more than 100 Iranian cities for over five months before they receded in February, although protests in some regions and chanting from rooftops still continue and pockets of street protests have also been observed.

In Zahedan, the capital of Sistan-Baluchistan Province protests have taken place every Friday since September. Hundreds have been reportedly killed or wounded during the protests over the past six months.

Gen. Karami called the ‘Woman, life, freedom’ protests “Super Sedition” and claimed that his forces have overcome the unrest “successfully.” Using military terms for treatment of civil disobedience, Karami said: “We have grounded the enemy and its human resources and media backing it and badly defeated them.”

Since the start of the protests Iranian officials including Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and military commanders attributed the protests to “conspiracies” hatched by foreign powers and media.