They are shown handcuffed, their faces blurred. The confession videos, broadcast on Iranian state media, feature dramatic background music interspersed with clips appearing to show protesters attacking security forces.

Some showcase gruesome homemade weapons that authorities claim were used in the attacks. Others highlight suspects in grainy security footage, appearing to set fires or destroy property.

Iran alleges these confessions, which often include references to Israel or America, are proof of foreign plots behind Iran’s nationwide protests.

Activists say they are coerced confessions, long a staple of Iran’s hard-line state television, the only broadcaster in the country. And these videos are coming at an unprecedented clip.

Iranian state media has aired at least 97 confessions from protesters, many expressing remorse for their actions, since the protests began on December 28, according to a rights group that is tracking the videos.

Confessions after torture

The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency says that based on testimony from prior detainees, the confessions often come after psychological or physical torture — and can have serious consequences, including the death penalty.

“These rights violations compound on top of each other and lead to horrible outcomes. This is a pattern that’s been implemented by the regime time and time again,” said Skylar Thompson, the group’s deputy director.

Iran’s mission to the United Nations did not return a request for comment from The Associated Press.

Iranian officials have described the protests as “riots” orchestrated by the United States and Israel. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has said the violence must be foreign-influenced because Iranians would never set mosques on fire.

The nearly 100 confessions broadcast over just two weeks is unprecedented for Iran, Mr. Thompson said.

Confessions in the past

By comparison, from 2010 to 2020 there were around 350 forced confessions broadcast on state media, according to the activist groups Justice for Iran and the International Federation for Human Rights, the last major study compiled by activists.

The rights group Together Against the Death Penalty said there were 40 to 60 confessions aired in 2025.

Additionally, Iran Human Rights and Together Against the Death Penalty reported at least 37 televised confessions of people facing the death penalty in the weeks following the 2022 protests over the death of Mahsa Amini after her arrest by the country’s morality police for allegedly not wearing her hijab to the liking of authorities.

More than 500 people were killed and over 22,000 detained during the monthslong protests and security crackdown, the last major protests in Iran.

A 2014 UN Special Rapporteur human rights report on Iran found that among interviews with previously detained individuals, 70% said coerced information or confessions were used in their hearings. In nearly half the cases, the trial lasted just a few minutes.

Executions

After the Amini protests, the European Parliament adopted a resolution in January 2023 strongly condemning “the Islamic Republic’s policy of forcing confessions using torture, intimidation, threats against family members or other forms of duress, and the use of these forced confessions to convict and sentence protesters.”

In 2024, Iran executed 975 people, the highest number since 2015, according to a report by the United Nations. Four of the executions were carried out publicly.

Iran carries out executions by hanging. According to the UN report, most people in Iran are executed for drug-related offenses or murder.

In 2024, security-related offenses, such as espionage, accounted for just 3% of the executions.

Thompson said she is “gravely concerned” over a surge in executions connected to the latest protests, adding that many of the video confessions are serious security-related offenses that carry the death penalty.

Tehran is known to have executed 12 people for espionage since the 12-day war in June between Israel and Iran.

The most recent execution for espionage was last week, when Iran said it executed a man who was accused of spying for Israel’s Mossad spy agency in exchange for cryptocurrency. The state-run IRNA news agency said the man confessed to the spying charges.

The use of televised, coerced confessions dates to the chaotic years after Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution. State TV aired confessions by suspected members of communist groups, insurgents and others.

Even Mehdi Bazargan, Iran’s first prime minister after the revolution, warned at one point he could be detained and put on television, “repeating things like a parrot.”

Among coerced confessions that gained international attention was in 2009 by then-Newsweek correspondent Maziari Bahari, who was also imprisoned for several months. He directed a documentary, “Forced Confessions,” and wrote a memoir about his ordeal.

Arrested, killed

Since the protests began on December 28, 16,700 people have been arrested and more than 2,000 have been killed, the vast majority protesters, according to Human Rights Activists News Agency.

The organisation relies on a network of activists inside Iran that confirms all reported fatalities.

The Iranian government has not released overall casualty figures for the demonstrations. The AP has been unable to independently assess the toll, given that the internet is now blocked in Iran.

Even before the protest movement exploded across the country, human rights organisations and Western governments have condemned Iran’s increasing use of capital punishment, particularly for political and espionage-related offenses.

Activists argue that many of the convictions rely on coerced confessions, and that trials often take place behind closed doors, without access to independent legal representation.

Published – January 14, 2026 03:51 am IST

U.S. President Donald Trump said Iran wants to negotiate with Washington after his threat to strike the Islamic Republic over its crackdown on protesters in nationwide demonstrations that activists said on Monday (January 12, 2026) had left at least 599 people dead.

Iran had no direct reaction to Mr. Trump’s comments, which came after the foreign minister of Oman — long an interlocutor between Washington and Tehran — travelled to Iran this weekend. It also remains unclear just what Iran could promise, particularly as Trump has set strict demands over its nuclear programme and its ballistic missile arsenal, which Tehran insists is crucial for its national defence.

FOLLOW | Iran protests LIVE updates

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, speaking to foreign diplomats in Tehran, insisted “the situation has come under total control” in remarks that blamed Israel and the US for the violence, without offering evidence.

“That’s why the demonstrations turned violent and bloody to give an excuse to the American president to intervene,” Araghchi said, in comments carried by Al Jazeera. The Qatar-funded network has been allowed to report live from inside Iran, despite the internet being shut off.

However, Mr. Araghchi said Iran was “open to diplomacy.” Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei said that a channel to the US remained open, but talks needed to be “based on the acceptance of mutual interests and concerns, not a negotiation that is one-sided, unilateral and based on dictation.”

Meanwhile, pro-government demonstrators flooded the streets on Monday in support of the theocracy, a show of force after days of protests directly challenging the rule of 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Iranian state television aired chants from the crowd, which appeared to number in the tens of thousands, who shouted “Death to America!” and “Death to Israel!”

Iran’s attorney general has said prosecutors will levy such charges against protesters, which carry the death penalty.

Trump acknowledges proposal for talks

Mr. Trump and his national security team have been weighing a range of potential responses against Iran, including cyberattacks and direct strikes by the U.S. or Israel, according to two people familiar with internal White House discussions who weren’t authorised to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

“The military is looking at it, and we’re looking at some very strong options,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One on Sunday night. Asked about Iran’s threats of retaliation, he said: “If they do that, we will hit them at levels that they’ve never been hit before.”

Mr. Trump said that his administration was in talks to set up a meeting with Tehran, but cautioned that he may have to act first as reports of the death toll in Iran mount and the government continues to arrest protesters.

“I think they’re tired of being beat up by the United States,” Mr. Trump said. “Iran wants to negotiate.”

Iran, through the country’s parliamentary speaker, warned Sunday that the U.S. military and Israel would be “legitimate targets” if Washington uses force to protect demonstrators.

More than 10,600 people also have been detained over the two weeks of protests, said the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency, which has been accurate in previous unrest in recent years and gave the death toll. It relies on supporters in Iran crosschecking information. It said 510 of the dead were protesters and 89 were security force members.

With the internet down in Iran and phone lines cut off, gauging the demonstrations from abroad has grown more difficult. The Associated Press has been unable to independently assess the toll. Iran’s government hasn’t offered overall casualty figures.

Those abroad fear the information blackout is emboldening hard-liners within Iran’s security services to launch a violent crackdown. Protesters flooded Tehran’s streets and its second-largest city on Saturday night into Sunday morning. Online videos purported to show more demonstrations Sunday night into Monday, with a Tehran official acknowledging them in state media.

At 2 p.m. on Monday, Iranian state television showed images of demonstrators thronging Tehran toward Enghelab Square, or “Islamic Revolution” Square in the capital. It had been airing statements all morning from Iranian government, security and religious leaders to attend the demonstration.

It called the rally an “Iranian uprising against American-Zionist terrorism,” without addressing the underlying anger in the country over the nation’s ailing economy. State television aired images of such demonstrations around the country, trying to signal it had overcome the protests.

Fear pervades Iran’s capital

In Tehran, a witness told the AP that the streets were empty at the sunset call to prayers each night. By the Isha, or nighttime prayer, the streets are deserted.

Part of that stems from the fear of getting caught in the crackdown. Police sent the public a text message that warned: “Given the presence of terrorist groups and armed individuals in some gatherings last night and their plans to cause death, and the firm decision to not tolerate any appeasement and to deal decisively with the rioters, families are strongly advised to take care of their youth and teenagers.”

Another text, which claimed to come from the intelligence arm of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, also directly warned people not to take part in demonstrations.

The witness spoke on condition of anonymity due to the ongoing crackdown.

The demonstrations began December 28 over the collapse of the Iranian rial currency, which trades at more than 1.4 million to USD 1, as iran’s economy is squeezed by international sanctions in part levied over its nuclear programme. The protests intensified and grew into calls directly challenging Iran’s theocracy.

Video shows corpses outside capital

Meanwhile, video circulating online purports to show dozens of bodies in a morgue on the outskirts of Iran’s capital.

People with knowledge of the facility and the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency said Monday that the video shows the Kahrizak Forensic Medicine Centre.

In the footage, people are seen walking by dozens of bodies in bags laid out in a large room, attempting to identify those there. In some cases, bodies can be seen lying outside on blue tarps. A large truck can be seen in part of the footage.

Published – January 13, 2026 05:31 am IST

U.S. President Donald Trump in the Oval Office at the White House. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Unrest ‍in Iran has killed more than 500 people, a rights group said on Sunday (January 11, 2026), as Tehran threatened to target U.S. military bases if President Donald Trump carries out threats to intervene on behalf of protesters.

With the Islamic ​Republic’s clerical establishment facing the biggest demonstrations since 2022, Mr. Trump has repeatedly threatened to intervene if force is used on protesters.

Iran protests updates – January 11, 2026

According to its latest figures — ‌from activists inside and outside Iran — U.S.-based rights group HRANA said it had verified the deaths of 490 protesters and 48 security personnel, with more than 10,600 people ​arrested in two weeks of unrest.

Iran has not given an official toll and Reuters was unable to independently verify the tolls. Trump was to be briefed by his officials on Tuesday on options over Iran including military strikes, using secret cyber weapons, widening sanctions and providing online help to anti-government sources, the Wall Street Journal said on Sunday.

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.

Authorities intensify crackdown

The protests began on December 28 in response to soaring prices, before turning against the clerical rulers who have governed since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Iranian authorities accuse the U.S. and Israel of fomenting trouble and called for a nationwide rally on Monday (January 12, 2026) to condemn “terrorist actions led by the United States and Israel” in Iran, state media ​reported.

The flow of information from Iran has been hampered by an internet blackout since Thursday.

Footage posted on social media on Saturday from Tehran showed large crowds marching ⁠along a street at night, clapping and chanting. The crowd “has no end nor beginning,” a man is heard saying.

In footage from the northeastern city of Mashhad, smoke can be seen billowing into the night sky from fires in the street, masked protesters, and a road strewn with debris, another video posted on Saturday showed. Explosions could be heard.

Reuters verified the locations.

State TV showed dozens of body bags on the ground at the Tehran coroner’s office, saying the dead were victims ​of events caused by “armed terrorists”, as well as footage of loved ones gathered outside the ⁠Kahrizak Forensic Medical Centre in Tehran waiting to identify bodies.

Three days ‘mourning for martyrs’

Authorities on Sunday declared three days of national mourning “in honour of martyrs killed in resistance against the United States and the Zionist regime,” according to state media.

Three Israeli sources, who were present for Israeli security consultations over the weekend, said Israel was on a high-alert footing for the possibility of any U.S. intervention.

An Israeli military official said the protests were an internal Iranian matter, but Israel’s military was monitoring developments and was ready to respond “with power if need be”. Israel and Iran fought a ‌12-day war in June last year, which the United States briefly joined by attacking key nuclear installations. Iran retaliated by firing missiles at Israel and an American air base ‌in Qatar.

Iran denounces ‘rioters and terrorists’

While the Iranian authorities have weathered previous protests, the latest have unfolded with Tehran still recovering from last year’s war and with its regional position weakened by blows to allies such as Lebanon’s Hezbollah since the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attacks against Israel. Iran’s unrest comes as Trump flexes U.S. ‍muscles on the world stage, having ousted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, and floating the possibility of acquiring Greenland by purchase or military force.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, in a TV interview, said Israel and the U.S. were masterminding destabilisation and that Iran’s enemies had brought in “terrorists… who set mosques on fire…. attack banks, and public properties”.

“Families, I ask you: do not allow your young children to join rioters and terrorists who ‍behead people and kill others,” he said, adding that the government was ready to listen to the people and to resolve economic problems.

Britain ambassador summoned

Iran summoned Britain’s ambassador on Sunday to the foreign ministry in Tehran over “interventionist comments” attributed to the British foreign minister and a protester removing the Iranian flag from the London Embassy building and replacing it with a style of flag that was used prior to the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Britain’s foreign office did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Alan Eyre, a former U.S. diplomat and Iran expert, thought it unlikely the protests would topple the establishment.

“I think it more likely that it puts these protests down eventually, but emerges from the process far weaker,” he told Reuters, noting that Iran’s elite still appeared cohesive and there was no organised opposition.

Iranian state TV broadcast funeral processions in western cities such as Gachsaran and Yasuj for security personnel killed in protests.

State TV said 30 members of the security forces would be buried in the central city of Isfahan and that six more were killed by “rioters” in Kermanshah in the west.

Published – January 12, 2026 04:47 am IST