Iran protests latest: Khamenei insists he will ‘not back down’ as he blames Trump for millions taking to streets – UK Times

Economic hardship has deepened significantly since September, when the United Nations reimposed sanctions on the country due to its atomic programme.

This has plunged Iran’s rial currency into freefall, now exchanging at more than 1.4m to $1. Concurrently, Tehran’s self-described “Axis of Resistance” – a coalition of countries and militant groups backed by the capital – has been significantly weakened since the onset of the Israel-Hamas conflict in 2023.

The president of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, has hit out at the EU’s Iran Mission amid ongoing protests in the country.

On Thursday, the Iran Mission wrote that it rejected the “interventionist statements” made by the EU President.

It wrote: “Their hypocrisy and double-standard approach towards rights and principles is disgusting.”

Metsola responded on X/Twitter on Friday, writing: “Must be nice to be able to tweet from Europe and be able to use the Internet freely to publicly disagree with leaders, without being arrested, beaten or having the country’s telecommunications disabled.

“That’s the sort of thing people in Iran’s streets are asking for…”

Several flights between Dubai and Iranian cities, Tehran, Shiraz and Mashhad, have been cancelled amid political arrest across the country.

A flydubai spokesperson said that flights to Iran had been cancelled and that the airline “will continue to monitor the situation” and revise its flight schedule accordingly in a statement on Friday.

It did not give a reason for the disruption. Two flights between Doha, Qatar and Tehran scheduled for Friday had been cancelled. Turkish media reported Turkish Airlines cancelled 17 flights. Pegasus Airlines also cancelled flights to Iranian cities on Friday.

Scenes in Iran resemble a “war zone” in the aftermath of widespread protests in Tehran, according to local media.

“This looks like a war zone – all the shops have been destroyed,” said a star journalist in front of the fires on Shariati Street in the Caspian Sea port of Rasht.

Images emerging from the country show burning buses, cars and motorbikes as well as fires at metro stations and banks.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameini has called President Donald Trump “arrogant”, saying he would be “overthrown” in his first public address since protests erupted across Iran.

He said protestors are “ruining their own streets on make the President of another country happy”.

Khameini insisted the Islamic Republic would not “back down”.

“The Islamic Republic will not tolerate mercenaries working for foreign powers,” he continued.

“To President Trump: focus on the problems in your own country.”

He added: “Everyone should know that the Islamic Republic came to power with the blood of hundreds of thousands of honorable people, and it will not back down in the face of saboteurs.”

At least 38 people have been killed with more than 2,200 arrested, according to the agency, which relies on an activist network inside of Iran for its reporting.

Understanding the scale of the protests has been difficult. Iranian state media has provided little information about the demonstrations.

Online videos offer shaky glimpses of people in the streets or the sound of gunfire. Journalists in general in Iran also face limits on reporting such as requiring permission to travel around the country, as well as the threat of harassment or arrest by authorities.

But the protests do not appear to be stopping, even after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday said “rioters must be put in their place.”

Footage and images from Iran, which is facing a blackout, shows disruption across the city of Tehran as demonstrators demand regime change.

Economic hardship has deepened significantly since September, when the United Nations reimposed sanctions on the country due to its atomic programme. This has plunged Iran’s rial currency into freefall, now exchanging at more than 1.4 million to $1. Concurrently, Tehran’s self-described “Axis of Resistance” – a coalition of countries and militant groups backed by the capital – has been significantly weakened since the onset of the Israel-Hamas conflict in 2023.

Read the full story below.

Buildings were set on fire in Tehran and Iran faced a complete internet blackout on Thursday evening as massive protests over the economy spread across the country.

People took to the streets in a growing list of cities across the country, in what was rapidly becoming one of the biggest challenges ever to Iran’s clerical leadership.

It was a new escalation in unrest that has spread nationwide across the Islamic Republic, and represented the first test of whether the Iranian public could be swayed by appeals from Reza Pahlavi, whose fatally ill father fled Iran just before the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution.