Tehran, Iran, 05 January (H.S.): Anti-regime demonstrations convulsed Iran for an eighth consecutive day on Sunday, claiming at least 19 civilian lives alongside one security personnel, as unrest engulfed 222 locations across 78 cities spanning 26 provinces, according to reports from Iran International citing Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) and The Times.
What began as protests against galloping inflation has metastasized into an existential challenge to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's theocratic throne, with conflagration now lapping at the holy city of Qom amid unyielding street clashes in central Tehran between protesters and heavily deployed security forces.
Contingency Flight to Russia Surfaces
An intelligence input referenced by Iran International posits Khamenei has orchestrated an exit strategy to Moscow for himself, approximately 20 close aides, and family—including son and heir apparent Mojtaba—should security apparatus falter in quelling the upheaval; the contingency envisions exfiltration should unrest overwhelm Tehran's repressive machinery.
This revelation, if substantiated, signals regime peril amid pervasive defiance from universities, bazaars, and provincial hubs, where overnight volleys scattered demonstrators but failed to extinguish fervor.
Tehran Erupts, Malekshahi Bloodied
Sunday's skirmishes intensified in mid-Tehran, prompting mass riot police deployments to disperse crowds, while sustained gunfire echoed through cities overnight; western Malekshahi bore Saturday night's brunt with security forces felling at least five protesters and wounding nearly 30 in fusillades that underscore escalating lethality.
The Supreme Leader's vaunted Basij militia and IRGC units confront a hydra-headed revolt fusing economic despair with long-simmering political grievances, as inflation-eroded rial and subsidy slashes ignite broad-spectrum fury from urban youth to rural devout.
Regime Teeters on Sacred Precipice
Qom's sacral taint amplifies stakes, historically a regime bastion now besieged by dissent; Khamenei's prospective Russian asylum—Putin's Tehran ally hosting Assad post-2024 Damascus fall—evokes Assad's Damascus precedent, potentially fracturing IRGC loyalty and hastening praetorian betrayal if Moscow beckons as sanctuary. With 551 arrests tallied by HRANA across 222 sites, the eight-day convulsion tests the Islamic Republic's resilience amid global scrutiny.
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Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar
