00:00This is Apropos.
00:03The US president is urging Iranians to keep protesting against the country's theocratic
00:08leadership as international outrage grows over a crackdown one rights group says has
00:14likely killed thousands.
00:16The regime is insisting that it's regained control of the streets after more than two
00:20weeks of nationwide unrest that's posed one of the biggest challenges to the clerical
00:25leadership since it came to power in the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
00:30Rights groups say nearly 17,000 protesters have been detained as concerns meant that at
00:36least one man already risks imminent execution.
00:40With more on the international reaction, here's Eliza Herbert.
00:45As patchy internet and phone services slowly start to return to Iran, more limited footage,
00:51such as this undated shot of protesters, is circulating outside of the country.
00:56And the full scale of the crackdown is beginning to take shape.
01:01From Geneva on Tuesday, a spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights referenced
01:06conservative figures, saying hundreds of people have been killed and thousands arrested.
01:11The killing of peaceful demonstrators must stop.
01:16The labelling of protesters as terrorists to justify violence against them is unacceptable.
01:24The true death toll could be a lot higher.
01:27According to US-based human rights activist news agency, some 2,000 people have been killed.
01:33And Human Rights Watch says reports of other heinous violations and crimes are continuing to emerge,
01:39including that those detained are at risk of secret, arbitrary executions,
01:44as authorities have accused protesters of being enemies of God, which carries the death penalty.
01:50On Tuesday, the EU's foreign policy chief, Kayakalas, said additional sanctions on Iran were being discussed.
01:57And Germany's chancellor said the bloc's foreign ministers were working to ensure that
02:01a peaceful transition to a democratically legitimate government can take place in the country.
02:06Words that need to be backed by action and driven by the will of the Iranian people,
02:12according to some analysts.
02:15They don't want an Islamic republic.
02:17They should have listened to the activists on the ground who have been calling for a transition.
02:23One of the biggest question marks remains around what the United States is planning.
02:27President Donald Trump has dialled up the pressure by repeatedly threatening military intervention
02:32under the guise of a regime change.
02:35And on Tuesday, he took to social media and urged protesters to keep going,
02:39saying he had cancelled all meetings with Iranian officials and that, quote,
02:44help is on its way.
02:45For more, we're joined now by Iran Keshavazian, author and professor of Middle Eastern and Islamic studies
02:53at New York University.
02:55Thanks so much for being with us on the programme.
02:58As we heard there, Donald Trump saying help is on its way.
03:01He's already announced tariffs for Iran's trading partners.
03:05He is this evening threatening what he says will be very strong action if Iran goes as far
03:11as executing some of these protesters.
03:13How do you think Donald Trump is going to respond to what's happening in the country?
03:21Good evening.
03:22Well, it's always very difficult to predict Donald Trump's actions.
03:27Frankly, I'm not even sure he and his team have a precise plan.
03:32While, of course, Iran has been on the U.S. foreign agenda for many years, decades,
03:39you know, he came into the presidency wanting to focus not on the Middle East.
03:45And yet and yet again, he's been dragged into Middle East issues.
03:50The military options are there, but supporting the protesters can't be done with just simply
03:57shooting missiles and bombing, for instance, the nuclear targets, as the United States and Israel did in the summer.
04:06I suspect a lot of the discussion is around trying to support the protesters when it comes to communications,
04:14access to Internet and information.
04:18Other than that, I'm at a bit of a loss as to what can be done.
04:24The sort of action that took place in Venezuela would be far more complicated than the Iranian case,
04:29where Iran is much farther away from the United States, the location of the supreme leader
04:37and the main generals are scattered and harder to locate and so forth.
04:42And you mentioned communication there around with the Internet blackouts that have been imposed on people in Iran.
04:48Is it possible to actually have a clear picture of what's happening on the ground?
04:52Do you have any indication from people that you've perhaps spoken with?
04:55Yes, it's been very difficult these last, now it's about six days.
05:02I personally have only had a very spotty communication with my relatives there.
05:11And it's very unclear.
05:13Even the people within Iran themselves are not sure what has taken place.
05:17Remember, it's not only the people from the outside can't communicate with people in Iran,
05:21but Iranians within the country don't have information about what's happening in different cities, different places.
05:29It is clearly there's been a lot of brutality, a lot of violence unleashed by the security forces in the past three, four days.
05:39We know hundreds, unfortunately, maybe even thousands have been killed.
05:42We also know that there's been a significant amount of violence by some of the members of the protests.
05:50We know that the government itself has named security officials that have been killed and shot and so forth.
05:57So it's a confused and confusing situation where, while it is nice for Donald Trump to argue that the protesters can seize institutions,
06:07there's very little evidence that there is this sort of mass organizations developed by the protesters or, for instance, by Reza Pahlavi to take on that task of taking over,
06:19for instance, ministries or radio and TV stations or anything like that.
06:26We're far, far from that level of organizational capacity by opponents to the regime.
06:34And we've heard a lot of speculation in the last few days as well about how this could possibly be the end of the line for the regime.
06:41How vulnerable do you believe the Iranian government is here?
06:45It's survived a lot in the past from wars, rebellion, isolation, sanctions.
06:51Do you think this is the end of the line for it or are we even close to that?
06:56You're absolutely right to underline all of the challenges the regime has faced over the past 47 years,
07:03but especially the last, let's say, 10, 15 years, there's been countless protests, waves of protests,
07:09some of it around elections, some of it around women's rights issues,
07:14some of it around fundamental economic and social welfare issues.
07:18This moment, though, is a truly deep crisis because you have a kind of a confluence of all of these factors coming together all at once.
07:28You have this dire economic situation where clearly large portions of the population simply don't trust
07:34and believe that the regime is able to manage the economic crisis, the lack of access to hard currency,
07:42the skyrocketing inflation.
07:44Meanwhile, the regime also this summer was deeply weakened militarily and sort of embarrassed by the Israeli attack,
07:52not only on the country, but its own generals and so forth.
07:55So the regime is also weakened on the political front.
08:02On the other hand, my sense at this current juncture is that the opposition is, while incredibly angry,
08:09having many a long list of grievances, they don't have the organizational capacities or the leadership
08:15to sustain this sort of level of protest for weeks and months.
08:21And that's, frankly, what a truly revolutionary change requires.
08:25So we're in a situation where there is a sort of a stalemate.
08:28There are many other scenarios other than the revolution that can emerge, such as a military coup
08:33or some other kind of fracturing or transformation.
08:37But there's a lot that we have to pay attention to in the coming days and weeks.
08:45And what do you make of these calls for the exiled son of the last Shah to be reinstalled, Reza Pahlavi?
08:52How wide is his support base in Iran?
08:54Well, I mean, one thing that can be said is that his, in a sense, his name recognition
09:02and his public calling out of support for him in this past two weeks has far more than it was,
09:10for instance, two, three years ago during the Women's Life Freedom protests or earlier years.
09:16But the confusing part for many of us analysts is when people take to the streets and say
09:22long-lived the Shah, for instance, what do they exactly mean?
09:26Do they actually want the return of monarchy and Reza Pahlavi?
09:30Or what I'm more sympathetic to is a notion that there are so few good options for Iranians
09:35at this current juncture that he is the only concrete name that can come to the fore,
09:42which is a sad situation because there are many important democratic figures in Iran,
09:49some of them unfortunately languishing in prisons, but they don't have the organizational capacity
09:58to come together to build a big coalition.
10:01And until this moment, Reza Pahlavi has not truly reached out to neither other opposition
10:07figures outside and inside the country, but he hasn't even really reached out to
10:11the Iranian bureaucracy or members of the military to draw them away from the regime.
10:19These are exactly the sort of steps that most revolutionary leaders do is to actually try to build
10:25a broad coalition intent.
10:29Most of Reza Pahlavi's energies these past couple of years has been visiting politicians
10:35and capitals of foreign countries, U.S. and Europe and Israel and so forth.
10:41I don't see that as a recipe for supporting the deeply aggrieved Iranian protesters.
10:48And Iran, Iran is claiming as well that this unrest is being manipulated from abroad.
10:53We might think initially here and specifically of Israel.
10:56Is Donald Trump going to be influenced by what the Israeli prime minister is perhaps saying to him?
11:01I think, obviously, Israel has a close line of communication with Donald Trump and Washington
11:11political decision makers and so forth.
11:14It will be I would be surprised if Donald Trump makes a decision and keeps Israel out in the dark.
11:20But at the other hand, we've also seen that Donald Trump is able to actually approach the Middle East
11:26independently of Israel.
11:29As for the Islamic Republic blaming everything on foreign terrorists and so forth,
11:35they've been doing this for years, decades.
11:38And while there is some truth that there are conspiracies, there are foreign groups and agents,
11:44the Israeli government and Mossad publicly claims that it has infiltrated Iran and so forth.
11:50So while there may be some of that, I believe most Iranians have tired of that line of analysis
11:57where all problems in Iran and all problems facing Iranians can be blamed on Israel,
12:04the United States and outsiders.
12:05This is a situation where the political establishment in Iran has to take responsibility
12:12and has to devise a forward thinking set of reforms, political, economic, social and so forth.
12:19Iran, thanks so much for joining us with that analysis.
12:23We'll have to leave it there for now.
12:24That is Iran Kesha Varzian, author and professor of Middle Eastern and Islamic studies
12:28at New York University.
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