Iran eases communications blackout as protests continue

President Donald Trump said on Tuesday the United States would take "very strong action" if the Iranian government starts hanging protesters, but did not elaborate on what those actions would be.

"I haven't heard about the hanging. If they hang them, you're going to see some things... We will take very strong action if they do such a thing," Trump told CBS News in an interview.

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan discussed the latest developments with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi in a phone call on Tuesday, a Turkish foreign ministry source said.

The European Union has summoned Iran's ambassador in Brussels over the Islamic republic's response to the nationwide protests, an EU official said Tuesday on condition of anonymity.

EU chief Ursula von der Leyen earlier Tuesday said the bloc was "swiftly" moving towards drafting further sanctions on Iran over the "horrifying" number of people said to have been killed and wounded in the government's crackdown.

US President Donald Trump, asked what he meant by a social media post saying "help is on its way" to protesters in Iran, told reporters on Tuesday that they would have to figure it out.

"You're going to have to figure that one out. I'm sorry," Trump said in response to a question. Trump traveled to Detroit to give a speech on the economy.

Iranian authorities will press charges punishable by death against some individuals arrested during recent demonstrations, prosecutors said on Tuesday, as concern grew that one man arrested during the protests already risks imminent execution.

The office of the Tehran prosecutor said in a statement quoted by state television that an unspecified number would be charged with "moharebeh", or "waging war against God", a sharia law term which is a capital offence in Iran and used widely in the past in death penalty cases.

"A number of rioters whose charges are consistent with moharebeh will soon be sent to court," it said.

Italy's foreign minister on Tuesday said he had summoned the Iranian ambassador over the "absolutely unacceptable" crackdown by Iranian authorities to quell protests across the country.

"These days, men and women across Iran are fighting in the streets and squares, paying a very high price," minister Antonio Tajani told the lower house of parliament.

The European External Action Service summoned the Iranian ambassador to the European Union on Tuesday, an EU official told Reuters, as Iran's clerical establishment pressed its crackdown against the biggest demonstrations in years.

At least 734 people are confirmed to have been killed in an Iranian security force crackdown on protests, though the actual death toll is likely in the thousands, a rights group said Tuesday.

"The figures we publish are based on information received from fewer than half of the country's provinces and fewer than 10 percent of Iran's hospitals. The real number of those killed is likely in the thousands," the director of Norway-based NGO Iran Human Rights (IHR), Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, said.

The group said that, according to its latest verified toll, at least 734 protesters, including nine under the age of 18, had been killed and thousands more injured.

The true toll is likely significantly higher and remains uncertain.

The German foreign ministry said Tuesday it had summoned Iran's ambassador in Berlin and urged the Iranian government to "end the violence against its own citizens" amid widespread protests.

"The Iranian regime's brutal crackdown on its own population is shocking," the ministry said in a statement on X, adding that "the Iranian ambassador was summoned to the foreign ministry today".

Russia on Tuesday condemned what it described as "subversive external interference" in Iran's internal politics and said the US threats of new military strikes against the country were "categorically unacceptable."

"Those who plan to use externally inspired unrest as a pretext for repeating the aggression against Iran committed in June 2025 must be aware of the disastrous consequences of such actions for the situation in the Middle East and global international security," the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

The US-based HRANA rights group said on Tuesday it had verified the deaths of 2,003 people during Iran's protests, including 1,850 protesters, 135 government-affiliated individuals, nine people aged under 18, and nine non-protester civilians.

Britain will seek further sanctions on Iran and has summoned Tehran's ambassador in London "to answer for the horrific reports" of a deadly crackdown on protesters, Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said Tuesday.

Cooper told MPs in parliament that the United Kingdom will bring forward legislation "to implement full and further sanctions and sectoral measures" on Iran.

Cooper noted London has already sanctioned key players in Iran's oil, energy, nuclear and financial systems but would now target those in finance, energy, transport, software and "other significant industries which are advancing Iranian nuclear escalation".

She said the UK would work with the EU and others on any "additional measures".

Cooper said she had ordered the ambassador be summoned "to underline the gravity of this moment and to call Iran to answer for the horrific reports that we are hearing."

She added that she fears the reports "may underestimate the full scale of the horror" in Iran, and warned the world was watching.

"The UK will continue to confront the regime's lies, to call out its repression and to take the steps necessary to protect the UK's interests," she said.

Iranian authorities will press capital crime charges against some suspects arrested over recent demonstrations, prosecutors said Tuesday, as alarm grows that the Islamic Republic could extensively use the death penalty to crack down on the protests.

The office of the Tehran prosecutor said in a statement quoted by state television that an unspecified number would be charged with "moharebeh", or "waging war against God", a sharia law term which is a capital crime in Iran and used widely in the past in death penalty cases.

"A number of rioters whose charges are consistent with moharebeh will soon be sent to court," it said.

US President Donald Trump on Tuesday said Iranians should continue nationwide protests, take over institutions and record names of "killers and abusers," as authorities there cracked down on mass demonstrations.

"Iranian Patriots, KEEP PROTESTING," Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. "I have cancelled all meetings with Iranian Officials until the senseless killing of protesters STOPS. HELP IS ON ITS WAY."

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer is expected to accept an offer to serve on a board led by US President Trump-led board that would temporarily run Gaza, The Times newspaper reported on Tuesday.

The report cited a senior British official as saying the first meeting was expected to take place next week on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

France's foreign minister said he had summoned the Iranian ambassador on Tuesday over the "unbearable and inhumane" crackdown by Iranian authorities to quell protests across the country.

"I have conveyed this condemnation to my Iranian counterpart. It will be reiterated to the Iranian ambassador in Paris, whom I summoned today," Jean-Noel Barrot told lawmakers in parliament.

"There can be no impunity for those who turned their weapons against peaceful protesters."

Ireland said Tuesday it was postponing a ceremony to allow Iran's new ambassador in Dublin to present his credentials amid a violent crackdown on protesters by Iranian authorities.

The decision "to postpone the ceremony of credentials for the ambassador-designate of the Islamic Republic of Iran was taken in light of protests in Iran in recent days," an Irish foreign affairs ministry spokesperson said in a statement to AFP.

The protests "have seen very significant numbers of Iranians killed or injured and a communications blackout," it said.

Eshaq Al-Habib was appointed by Iran's Ministry of Foreign Affairs in late 2025.

He was due to formally assume the role after presenting his credentials to Ireland's President, Catherine Connolly, at her residence on Tuesday.

President Donald Trump's administration has made good on its pledge to label three Middle Eastern branches of the Muslim Brotherhood as terrorist organisations, imposing sanctions on them and their members in a decision that could have implications for US relationships with allies Qatar and Turkey.

The Treasury and State departments announced the actions Tuesday against the Lebanese, Jordanian and Egyptian chapters of the Muslim Brotherhood, which they said pose a risk to the United States and American interests.

The State Department designated the Lebanese branch a foreign terrorist organisation, the most severe of the labels, which makes it a criminal offense to provide material support to the group. The Jordanian and Egyptian branches were listed by Treasury as specially designated global terrorists for providing support to Hamas.

"These designations reflect the opening actions of an ongoing, sustained effort to thwart Muslim Brotherhood chapters' violence and destabilisation wherever it occurs," Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement. "The United States will use all available tools to deprive these Muslim Brotherhood chapters of the resources to engage in or support terrorism."

Syria's army told Kurdish forces on Tuesday to withdraw from an area they control east of Aleppo after dislodging fighters from two neighbourhoods in the city in deadly clashes last week.

The move raises fresh concerns of further fighting between the two sides, as Syria's Islamist government seeks to extend its authority across the country and progress stalls on integrating the Kurds' de facto autonomous administration and forces into the central government.

Syrian state television published an army statement with a map declaring a large area east of Aleppo city a "closed military zone" and said "all armed groups in this area must withdraw to east of the Euphrates" River.

The area begins near Deir Hafer, around 50 kilometres (30 miles) east of Aleppo and extends to the Euphrates further east, as well as towards the south.

On Monday, Syria accused the US-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces of sending reinforcements to Deir Hafer and said it sent its own personnel there in response.

The SDF is the de facto army of the Kurds' semi-autonomous administration and controls swathes of the country's oil-rich north and northeast, much of which it captured during Syria's civil war and the fight against the Islamic State group.

EU chief Ursula von der Leyen said Tuesday Brussels would "swiftly" propose new sanctions on Iran, after a dramatic increase in casualties from a crackdown on mass protests.

"The rising number of casualties in Iran is horrifying. I unequivocally condemn the excessive use of force and continued restriction of freedom," she posted online.

"Further sanctions on those responsible for the repression will be swiftly proposed," she added.

A military escalation between the United States and Iran would have grave consequences for the region, Qatar said Tuesday after Washington threatened strikes in response to a government crackdown on protests in the Islamic Republic.

"We know that any escalation... would have catastrophic results in the region and beyond, and therefore we want to avoid that as much as possible," Qatar's foreign ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari said at a press conference in Doha.

The UN children's agency said on Tuesday that over 100 children have been killed in Gaza since the October ceasefire, including victims of drone and quadcopter attacks.

“More than 100 children have been killed in Gaza since the ceasefire of early October," UNICEF spokesperson James Elder told reporters at a UN briefing by video link from Gaza.

"Survival remains conditional, whilst the bombings and the shootings have slowed, have reduced during the ceasefire, they have not stopped."

He said that nearly all the deaths of the 60 boys and 40 girls were from military attacks, including air strikes, drone strikes, tank shelling, gunfire and quadcopters, and a few were from war remnants that exploded.

Around 2,000 people were killed in Iran protests, an Iranian official told Reuters on Tuesday, blaming "terrorists" for the deaths of civilians and security personnel.

The New Arab cannot independently verify this information due to an information blackout in Iran.

Iraqi sources have told The New Arab's Arabic language site, Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, that scheduled flights between Sulaimaniyah Airport in northern Iraq and Tehran Airport have been suspended until further notice.

The United Nations rights chief voiced horror Tuesday at the mounting violence directed at protesters across Iran, amid reports that hundreds have been killed.

"The killing of peaceful demonstrators must stop, and the labelling of protesters as 'terrorists' to justify violence against them is unacceptable," Volker Turk said in a statement, decrying the authorities' decision "to inflict brutal force to repress legitimate demands for change".

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said on Tuesday he assumes Iran's leadership is in its "final days and weeks" as it faces widespread protests.

Demonstrations in Iran have evolved from complaints about dire economic hardships to calls for the fall of the clerical establishment in the Islamic Republic.

"I assume that we are now witnessing the final days and weeks of this regime," Merz said during a trip to India, questioning the Iranian leadership's legitimacy.

"When a regime can only maintain power through violence, then it is effectively at its end. The population is now rising up against this regime."

Merz said Germany was in close contact with the United States and fellow European governments on the situation in Iran, and urged Tehran to end its deadly crackdown on protesters. He did not comment on Germany's trade ties with Iran.

Finland's foreign minister said Tuesday that she would summon Iran's ambassador after Tehran's nationwide shutdown of the internet and violent crackdown on protests.

"Iran's regime has shut down the internet to be able to kill and oppress in silence," Finland's Minister of Foreign Affairs Elina Valtonen wrote on X.

"This will not be tolerated. We stand with the people of Iran - women and men alike", she said, adding that she would "summon the Iranian ambassador this morning."

Valtonen also said the Nordic country was also "exploring measures to help restore freedom to the Iranian people" together with the EU.

Iran’s regime has shut down the internet to be able to kill and oppress in silence. This will not be tolerated. We stand with the people of Iran—women and men alike.

I will summon the Iranian ambassador this morning. Together with the EU, Finland is exploring measures to help…

— Elina Valtonen (@elinavaltonen) January 13, 2026

International phone calls have resumed in Iran after being blocked for days, an AFP correspondent said on Tuesday, as demonstrations take place in the Islamic Republic.

It has been impossible to make phone calls abroad since Friday. The internet remains cut off, according to the Netblocks monitor.

Spain on Tuesday summoned Iran's ambassador to Madrid to express "strong repudiation and condemnation" of a crackdown on protests that rights groups say has killed hundreds, the foreign minister said.

"The right of Iranian men and women to peaceful protest, their freedom of expression, must be respected", and "arbitrary arrests must cease", Jose Manuel Albares told Catalunya Radio.

Tasnim News Agency, which is affiliated with Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, said on 12 January that the US government had seized its main domain, https://www.tasnimnews.com.

The site had been among the few Iranian news outlets still accessible from outside the country after authorities imposed a near-total internet shutdown on 8 January.

Tasnim has since restored access to its content by launching a replacement domain, https://www.tasnimnews.ir, which remains online.

The United States sanctioned Tasnim and several other Iranian media outlets in 2023 over their role in "the Iranian regime's violent suppression of nationwide protests" following the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody the previous year.

In 2021, the US government also seized the domains of multiple Iran-backed websites as part of broader measures targeting Iranian state-linked media and organisations.

Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi has warned the United States that Tehran is prepared for a military confrontation if necessary.

"We are ready for the war option, and our preparations are far bigger than the 12-day war at the quantitative and qualitative level," Araqchi said in an interview aired today by Al Jazeera.

At the same time, he stressed that Iran remains open to other paths. "We are also ready for diplomacy, and we are also ready for their economic options, and we have lived under the sanctions for a long time," he added.

Araqchi said contacts with US special envoy Steve Witkoff have continued since before the recent protests, saying he hoped Washington would choose "the wise option".

He also accused the United States and Israel of attempting to stir internal unrest inside Iran.

The Iraqi Iran-backed Kataib Hezbollah, also known as Hezbollah Brigades, has issued a warning to the United States against launching any attack on Iran.

"Our position will be clear and unequivocal in defending the people of Iran and its holy sites," the militia said in a statement released on Monday.

The group also called on other Iran-aligned armed groups in Iraq "not to pay attention to the voices of traitors and rumour mongers" and urged them to move quickly to defend Iran.

Addressing Washington directly, the statement added: "And to the American enemy, we warn that war on Iran is not a picnic, but a fire that, if ignited, will not be extinguished until your noses are rubbed in the dirt, and you will pay a price double what your greedy master [Trump] aspires to in terms of gains."

Kataib Hezbollah has recently called on Iraq to develop its defence systems following the US arrest of Venezuela's president and said it "completely rejected" Washington's calls and threats to disarm.

The nationwide shutdown of the internet by authorities in Iran, which activists fear is aimed at masking the scale of a crackdown on protests, has now lasted over 108 hours, a monitor said on Tuesday.

"It has been 108 hours since Iran introduced a nationwide internet shutdown leaving Iranians isolated from the rest of the world and each other," said Netblocks in a post on X in its latest update.

⚠️ Update: It has been 108 hours since #Iran introduced a nationwide internet shutdown leaving Iranians isolated from the rest of the world and each other 📉

The rights to free speech and free assembly are inviolable and must be protected #DigitalBlackoutIran pic.twitter.com/2pfCOpf6dm

— NetBlocks (@netblocks) January 13, 2026

The crackdown in Iran is targeting "defenceless" people who need the support of the international community to "put an end" to the current system, prominent Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi said on Tuesday.

"The Iranian people are defenceless today, and despite all that, they are out on the streets," he told broadcaster France Inter, denouncing the brutality of the crackdown, which has left at least 600 people dead, according to monitors.

China said on Tuesday it would protect its rights and interests after US President Donald Trump announced a 25 percent tariff on any country doing business with Iran.

"We have always believed that there are no winners in a tariff war, and China will resolutely safeguard its legitimate rights and interests," foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning told a regular news conference when asked about Trump's levy announcement.