Iranian officials have suggested that they are indeed ready to talk — while still warning against any attack.
The situation was now “under total control,” Iranian foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said in a briefing to foreign ambassadors in Tehran. He blamed the United States and Israel for the violence, without offering evidence.
“The demonstrations turned violent and bloody to give an excuse to the American president to intervene,” he said, according to the Qatar-owned news network Al Jazeera.
Meanwhile, Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf warned Washington against “a miscalculation.”
“Let us be clear: in the case of an attack on Iran, the occupied territories (Israel) as well as all U.S. bases and ships will be our legitimate target,” said Qalibaf, a former commander in Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards.
A mosque is set on fire during protests in Tehran, on Saturday. Social Media / ZUMA Press via Reuters
And there are few signs that the crackdown will ease up soon.
“We do truly believe that a massacre has taken place, and the extent and dimensions of it are yet to be known as the country comes out of the internet blockade, if it does,” Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of the Center for Human Rights in Iran, a New York-based advocacy group, told NBC News in a telephone interview. “They don’t seem in any rush to restore the internet.”
The U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) said Sunday that at least 544 people have been killed, 496 protesters and 48 security forces. Iranian authorities have released no official toll.
More than 10,000 people have been detained, according to HRANA.
Iranians gather while blocking a street during a protest in Tehran, on Friday.MAHSA / Middle East Images/AFP via Getty IMages
The demonstrations, which were sparked by economic grievances as the currency crashed and inflation soared, have now morphed into one of the biggest challenges the Islamic Republic has faced in its 47-year history, as thousands of people have taken to the streets to demand the end of the ruling clergy.
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres urged Iranian authorities to use “maximum restraint” in a post on X on Sunday.
“Shocked by reports of violence & excessive use of force by the Iranian authorities against protesters resulting in deaths & injuries in recent days,” he said.
At the morgue in Kahrizak, a town about five miles south of Tehran, the video geolocated by NBC News shows a TV screen scrolling through pictures of the dead, while the right side of the image shows a death toll of 250 and Friday’s date.
People gather on the streets during a protest in Mashhad, Iran, in a video posted to social media on Thursday.Social media / via Reuters
Iranian state TV broadcast video of pro-government supporters holding large counter-demonstrations planned by authorities on Monday. But the protests challenging the regime are likely to continue, analysts say.
“I think everything is fluid. It’s very hard to imagine what will happen in the coming days,” said Ghaemi of the Center for Human Rights in Iran.
Nollaig O’Connor and Gabrielle Khoriaty contributed.