Iran opens new case against actress who defied mandatory hijab

Intercepted radio communications, video footage and eyewitness accounts point to security forces operating from several mosques in and around the capital on January 8 and 9, when protests drew large crowds and authorities launched a deadly crackdown.

In one intercepted exchange, security personnel discussed deploying forces and equipment inside Imam Hossein Mosque, which Iran International geolocated to the intersection of Sattari and Mokhbari in western Tehran.

Witnesses described security operations around the mosque as electricity was cut in the area and surveillance drones flew overhead.

Other locations identified through footage and witness accounts included mosques along Andarzgoo Boulevard and Qolhak Grand Mosque.

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Witnesses also described security personnel positioned outside some mosques engaging protesters before forces inside emerged to beat and arrest them.

Taken together, the evidence suggests some mosques served not simply as gathering points but as bases from which security forces monitored and confronted protesters.

Shooting from rooftops

Several eyewitnesses described mosque rooftops being used as observation or firing positions.

One witness described several people positioned on the roof of a mosque near Kashani Boulevard in western Tehran on January 8.

“The sound of a stun grenade could be heard,” the witness said. “Once the crowd scattered a little, they started shooting from above.”

In Naziabad in southern Tehran, another witness described protesters coming under fire from elevated positions.

“They were being shot at from the rooftops of mosques and Basij bases,” the witness said.

Witnesses in the area described security forces firing directly at crowds and from elevated positions, with a number of protesters wounded or killed.

Video footage obtained by Iran International also showed surveillance drones flying above crowds during the protests.

Other witnesses described security personnel monitoring protesters with cameras from inside mosques. Some said windows at mosque buildings had been broken to create positions from which weapons could be fired and described seeing weapons fitted with laser sights.

In several areas, witnesses also said security forces pursued protesters who sought refuge in residential buildings or private parking garages, beating some of those sheltering inside and preventing injured protesters from leaving to seek medical treatment.

Iran International was not able to independently verify each of those accounts or determine who was responsible for individual shots seen or heard in footage.

Allegations of fires

Some witnesses alleged that security personnel themselves damaged or set fire to mosques that authorities could subsequently portray as having been attacked by protesters.

One witness also said security forces left gas valves open at a mosque before departing, creating the risk of a fire or explosion.

Iran International could not independently verify those accounts or establish whether any fires at the sites were deliberately started by security forces.

The allegations are significant because Iranian authorities repeatedly portrayed damage to mosques and other religious sites during the January unrest as evidence of violence by protesters.

Civilian sites used in crackdowns

The apparent use of mosques as operational sites in Tehran follows evidence that security forces used other civilian buildings during the January crackdown.

A separate Iran International investigation in neighboring Alborz province found security forces using a public library as an ammunition store and staging point, schools and mosques as gathering places for armed personnel, and the roof of a cinema as a firing position.

There is also precedent for security forces operating from or around religious sites during earlier protests.
Human Rights Watch documented security forces firing on protesters and bystanders from rooftops around Zahedan’s Grand Mosalla prayer hall and Makki Mosque during the September 2022 crackdown known as Bloody Friday.

The United Nations separately documented the use of live ammunition, tear gas and metal pellets against protesters following Friday prayers in Zahedan, with footage analyzed by the UN appearing to show security forces firing from rooftops.

The evidence gathered in Tehran suggests some mosques became part of the security apparatus during the January crackdown: used to assemble personnel and equipment, monitor crowds and, according to multiple eyewitnesses, confront protesters.

Images, videos and accounts posted widely on Persian-language social media showed closed stations and lines of cars at others still operating, with shortages reported in several parts of the capital, including central and northern Tehran.

The disruption was also acknowledged by state-affiliated media.

“Some gas stations have closed without a clear explanation, creating considerable concern and questions for people,” SSN wrote, calling on the government to explain whether the closures were part of an attempt to curb fuel consumption and how long they would last.

The shortages bring into the open a problem Iranian officials have been warning about for months: the country is consuming more gasoline than it can produce.

Reza Sepahvand, spokesperson for parliament’s Energy Committee, said this month that Iran was producing about 130 million liters of gasoline a day while consuming around 137 million liters, leaving a daily shortfall of about seven million liters.

Sepahvand also said gasoline imports had stopped under the US naval blockade, removing one of the ways Tehran had previously made up the difference between domestic production and demand.

Other official estimates have put the deficit even higher. Mohammad Jafar Ghaempanah, President Masoud Pezeshkian’s executive deputy, said this month that Iran faced a gasoline imbalance of around 14 million liters a day.

The government is therefore confronting an increasingly difficult choice: finding ways to reduce consumption without sharply raising the price motorists pay at the pump.

Iran has for years sold heavily subsidized gasoline, contributing to high consumption and imposing a growing burden on state finances. Pezeshkian himself has questioned the logic of buying fuel at international prices while selling it domestically at a fraction of the cost.

But attempts to raise gasoline prices carry considerable political risk.

A sudden increase in November 2019 triggered nationwide protests that quickly expanded into broader demonstrations against the Islamic Republic. Security forces responded with a deadly crackdown and a near-total internet shutdown.

The memory of those protests has made gasoline prices one of the most politically sensitive economic issues facing successive Iranian governments.

Officials have instead discussed alternatives including changes to fuel quotas, limiting subsidized gasoline and charging higher prices for consumption above allocated amounts.

But uncertainty over those plans has itself contributed to anxiety among motorists, with long queues reported at filling stations in recent days.

The supply squeeze comes as Iran faces a broader deterioration in economic conditions following months of war and sanctions.

Washington on Monday expanded its campaign of secondary sanctions against Tehran as part of what US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has called an “economic D-Day” intended to sever Iran’s remaining economic lifelines.

For motorists in Tehran, however, the consequences are increasingly immediate.

Social media reports on Monday described people visiting several stations before finding gasoline, waiting for hours in the summer heat and arriving at pumps only to find supplies exhausted.

The closures have also fueled speculation that restricting supply may itself be emerging as a way of forcing down consumption without announcing a politically dangerous price increase.

There has been no official announcement that the government has adopted such a policy.

More than 12,000 people also commented on the poll, with financial pressure, job insecurity, housing costs and concerns about children’s futures emerging repeatedly among the reasons given for putting off marriage or parenthood.

Some respondents said they wanted to marry or have children but lacked the financial or social conditions to do so. Others pointed to divorce and unsuccessful marriages as reasons for avoiding marriage.

Men accounted for 68% of respondents and women for 32%. The largest age group was 25 to 34, representing 40.3% of participants, followed by people aged 35 to 44 at 29.2%.

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Respondents aged 18 to 24 made up 13.3%, while those aged 45 to 54 accounted for 9.8%.

Economic pressures weigh on family plans

Many respondents linked their reluctance to start families to the cost of everyday life, according to an examination of comments submitted with the poll.

Some wrote that meeting their own expenses had become difficult enough and that supporting a spouse or child was beyond their financial means. Others said they remained interested in marriage or parenthood but could not afford either.

Iran has faced years of high inflation and a steep decline in the value of its currency, eroding household purchasing power and making housing and other basic costs harder to meet.

The economic strain has been compounded by international sanctions and government policies at home and abroad, with their contribution to Iran’s economic problems a subject of continuing political debate.

Personal experiences of divorce and unsuccessful marriages also appeared repeatedly in the responses. Some participants described marriage under present conditions as a “high-risk decision.”

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Others who were already married said they had decided against having children because of economic and social conditions. Respondents also cited mistrust and difficulty finding a suitable partner.

A smaller number expressed support for marriage or having children.

Parents question children's prospects

Concerns about the conditions in which children would grow up formed another major strand of the responses.

Some said they wanted children but were unwilling to bring them into a society where they feared they could face poverty, inflation, electricity shortages, insecurity and an uncertain future.

A number used much stronger language, describing having children under present circumstances as a “crime” or a “betrayal” of the child because parents could not guarantee an adequate quality of life or future.

Iran faces severe environmental challenges including air pollution, groundwater depletion, forest fires and wider ecosystem degradation. Experts have linked such problems to a combination of poor policymaking, weak environmental protections, corruption and insufficient resources.

Political outlook feeds pessimism

Some respondents connected their decisions directly to Iran’s political and social conditions and their expectations for the country’s future.

Years of economic hardship have coincided with repeated waves of anti-government protests and deadly crackdowns, alongside restrictions on political and social freedoms.

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For some participants, those pressures appeared to have turned decisions about marriage and parenthood into a broader judgment about what kind of future is possible in Iran.

The scale and substance of the responses point to a question facing many of them: not simply whether they can afford to build families, but whether they see a future in which they want to do so.

Afshin Heyratian’s days often began at 6 a.m. He would leave his home in Tehran and spend the day volunteering with an organization helping working children, Afghan children without birth certificates and others whose legal status could prevent them from accessing education.

Sometimes his work meant teaching. Sometimes it meant painting rooms or repairing tables and chairs. Often, it was simply spending time with the children and trying to make them happy.

“That was his passion,” his older brother, Ramin Heyratian, told Iran International’s Eye for Iran. “If one virtue was supposed to define a person, it is his kindness.”

A playwright and screenwriter, Afshin also helped friends write productions without receiving credit because of restrictions imposed on him, according to Ramin, who said this was his brother’s third imprisonment

A life interrupted

His latest ordeal began after he was questioned at the school where he volunteered. Security forces came to the family home on November 11, 2025, and arrested him.

Agents confiscated phones, tablets, computers, Baha’í books and even Baha’í pictures hanging on the walls, according to his brother.

Afshin then spent 34 days in solitary confinement. For the first days after his arrest, his family did not even know where he was.

Eventually, he was permitted to call his mother and tell her to prepare the deed to the family home, raising hopes that it could be used as collateral for his release.

The release never came.

Ramin said Afshin remained imprisoned for more than 260 days before being charged, while his mother was repeatedly sent between courts trying to find out what was happening.

“They were sending her back and forth almost every day,” he said.

Afshin had an opportunity to build a life outside Iran in the early 2000s and spent time in the United States, but ultimately chose to return.

“He truly loves Iran and Iranians,” Ramin said.

The case has drawn international condemnation. Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi has called for his release, while the Canadian government described his treatment as an example of Iran’s “continued disregard for human rights.”.

‘No lawyer, no warning’

The ordeal has been particularly devastating for Afshin’s mother, an 80-year-old cancer survivor.

She can now visit her youngest son approximately once every two or three weeks, Ramin said. Afshin is also allowed to telephone her each day.

Ramin said the family had been told Afshin would receive legal representation and that they would be notified before his court date.

Neither happened.

Instead, one of Afshin’s fellow prisoners alerted his own family that Afshin had been taken to court. Afshin’s mother learned what was happening while she was on her way to an oncology appointment.

She rushed to the courthouse.

Ramin said she waited in the hallways, trying to determine where her son was, until she suddenly heard Afshin behind her as he emerged from court.

By then, the hearing was over.

Afshin pleaded not guilty but had no lawyer representing him, Ramin said.

“He was basically his own lawyer,” he said.

When his mother asked how he was doing, Afshin reassured her.

“I’m okay. Don’t worry about it. We’ll be fine,” Ramin recalled him saying.

‘Life sentence’

Branch 26 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court sentenced Heyratian to prison terms totaling 31 years, according to the Hengaw Organization for Human Rights.

The sentences included 12 years for “forming an illegal group,” 11 years for “propaganda activities contrary to the sacred law of Islam,” six years for “assembly and collusion,” and two years over allegations of “obtaining illegitimate property.” Financial penalties were also imposed.

Under Article 134 of Iran’s Islamic Penal Code, only the most severe sentence, 12 years, is expected to be enforceable.

Ramin rejects the allegations against his brother.

“The things that they have attached to those charges … are, first of all, completely untrue,” he said, adding that the organization where Afshin volunteered had been permitted to operate in Iran.

Iran’s Baha’í community has faced decades of state persecution and restrictions on education, employment and other aspects of public life. The Islamic Republic does not recognize the Baha’í faith as one of the country’s protected religious minorities.

Ramin said the length of his brother’s punishment was extraordinary even by the standards of that persecution.

“At Afshin’s age, this can be a life sentence,” he said, adding that the family had not abandoned hope.

“We believe that the future of Iran is absolutely brilliant,” Ramin said. “We are hoping for that to happen soon.”

The roughly three-minute report focuses on Barron Trump and portrays attempts to identify ways of reaching him, using stylized graphics depicting surveillance, online activity and people in his surroundings.

The segment displays locations and online platforms purportedly associated with the effort and depicts attempts to map social connections around the president’s son and penetrate layers of Secret Service protection.

Iran International could not independently verify the operational claims made in the broadcast, which relies heavily on dramatized graphics and provides no evidence that any attempt to reach Barron Trump has succeeded.

But the decision to air such material on Iranian state television is significant in itself. Threats against Trump and other current and former US officials have featured for years in Iranian political rhetoric, state-linked media and rallies, alongside alleged assassination plots that US authorities have attributed to Tehran.

Similar videos have been broadcast before targeting Trump and his wife, Melania.

US prosecutors have previously accused members or associates of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards of plotting to kill former senior American officials, including former national security adviser John Bolton, in retaliation for the 2020 US killing of Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani.

Trump himself has also been the subject of alleged Iranian assassination plots. US prosecutors said in 2024 that Tehran had tasked an operative with developing a plan to kill him, while Iranian threats have contributed to heightened security around the president.

Such rhetoric has intensified dramatically since the war began on February 28, when US-Israeli strikes killed Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and other senior Iranian military and political figures.

Calls for revenge have since become a prominent feature of hardline messaging. Hundreds of thousands attending Khamenei’s funeral chanted against the United States and Israel, while some hardliners openly called for Trump’s assassination.

The latest broadcast marks a potentially significant escalation in that rhetoric by shifting the focus from Trump and US officials directly involved in policy toward Iran to the president’s family.

Toward the end of the segment, the narrator asserts “many would be willing” to take the $10 million reward connected to efforts targeting Barron Trump.