Iran marks anniversary of 1979 Islamic Revolution amid anti-government protests
- President Ebrahim Raisi referred to the protests as a project by Iran’s enemies to stop the nation from continuing its achievements
- Iran has seen protests since September after the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, with protests morphing to calls for a new revolution
Thousands of Iranians marched through major streets and squares decorated with flags, balloons and placards with revolutionary and religious slogans. The military put on display its Emad and Sejjil ballistic missiles and cruise missiles as well as its Shahed-136 and Mohajer drones.
In a speech at Azadi Square in the capital Tehran, President Ebrahim Raisi referred to the protests as a project by Iran’s enemies aimed at stopping the nation from continuing its achievements.
Raisi called the celebration “epic” and a show of “national integrity” while praising post-revolution achievements in the country.
The remarks prompted the crowd to chant “Death to the US”.
Meanwhile, Telewebion, a web TV service affiliated with Iranian state TV, was briefly hacked during Raisi’s speech, Iranian media reported. The khabaronline.ir news website said the interruption lasted 19 seconds .
Chants including “Death to Khamenei” and “Death to the Islamic Republic” could be heard on the video and a masked person with a woman’s voice read the message. The group previously hacked into the notorious Evin prison and other government facilities.
Processions in Tehran on Saturday started out from several points and converged at Azadi Square. TV showed crowds in many cities and towns and said hundreds of thousands of people participated.
The Iranian government has not offered an overall death toll or number of individuals it has arrested. However, activists outside of the country say at least 528 people have been killed and 19,600 people detained in the crackdown that followed.
Last week, Iran’s state media said the supreme leader ordered an amnesty or reduction in prison sentences for “tens of thousands” of people detained in during the protests, acknowledging for the first time the scale of the crackdown.
The decree by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, part of a yearly pardoning the supreme leader does before the anniversary, came as authorities have yet to say how many people they detained in the demonstrations.
Referring to the amnesty, Raisi on Saturday urged those who were “deceived by the enemy” to “return to the nation” and promised his administration would show mercy on them, too
Crowds waved Iranian flags, chanted slogans and carried placards with traditional anti-West slogans like “Death to America” and “Death to Israel”. Some burned flags of the US and Israel, a ritual in pro-government rallies.
The Islamic Revolution began with widespread unrest in Iran over the rule of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. The shah, terminally and secretly ill with cancer, fled Iran in January 1979. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini then returned from exile and the government fell on February 11, 1979, after days of mass demonstrations and confrontations between protesters and security forces.
Later in April, Iranians voted to become an Islamic Republic, a Shiite theocracy with Khomeini as the country’s first supreme leader, with final say on all matters of state.
Months later, when the US allowed the shah into the country for cancer treatment in New York, anger boiled over in Tehran leading to the takeover of the US embassy in November 1979 by militant students. The subsequent hostage crisis kindled decades of enmity.