Iran's Revolutionary Guards said six gunmen were killed on Thursday in an hours-long clash with security forces in southeastern Iran, the latest in a series of armed confrontations in the restive Sistan-Baluchestan province.
Haalvsh, which covers developments in Sistan-Baluchestan, said fighting in the Manzelab area near Zahedan began at about 6 a.m., with heavy gunfire and rocket-propelled grenade fire heard in the area.
The group said the confrontation between Iranian security forces and armed men continued for several hours.
IRGC says attack was being prepared
The IRGC's Quds regional headquarters said its forces had identified and "destroyed" what it described as an armed "terrorist-Takfiri" cell in Manzelab.
The Guards said the group had been preparing an attack but was detected before it could carry it out. Six members were killed and several explosive devices were recovered, according to the statement.
The IRGC did not identify the group or name those killed.
Series of clashes in southeast
Sistan-Baluchestan has seen repeated armed confrontations in recent weeks involving gunmen and Iranian security forces, including forces linked to the Fatemiyoun militia.
Earlier on Thursday, police officer Alireza Sanchouli was killed when gunmen attacked a checkpoint at the entrance to Rask, according to Iranian reports.
At least one person was also killed during a clash with security forces in Iranshahr on Tuesday.
Deadly battle in Saravan
Last month, a confrontation lasting about nine hours in the Bakhshan area of Saravan left three IRGC members and four gunmen dead.
The armed group People's Fighters Front was involved in that clash, according to reports at the time. The alliance, announced in late 2025, includes several Baluch armed groups, among them Jaish al-Adl.
Iranian authorities have repeatedly described armed groups operating in Sistan-Baluchestan as terrorist organizations. The southeastern province has long seen armed attacks, insurgent activity and recurring clashes between militant groups and security forces.
The Basij has long maintained a presence in Iran's high schools and universities. Its growing visibility among much younger children is drawing attention to a new front in the Islamic Republic's effort to shape a generation that has repeatedly challenged its authority.
As millions of students returned to classrooms this month, Iran's paramilitary Basij appeared prominently in elementary schools as authorities rolled out an education campaign infused with military and ideological messaging.
Iran's Education Ministry announced over the summer that material related to the recent war and the country's military and nuclear capabilities would be incorporated into educational content.
The push comes at a precarious moment for the Islamic Republic, following war, economic turmoil and nationwide unrest—and four years after schoolgirls became some of the youngest and most visible participants in the Woman, Life, Freedom uprising.
“Iran is obviously right now at sort of a crossroads,” historian Arash Azizi told Iran International, as the Islamic Republic struggles to command the loyalty of generations born decades after the 1979 revolution.
“We're talking about much younger people, people under 13,” Azizi said, adding that the Basij had some involvement in primary schools during the early years after the revolution, but considerably less in recent decades.
The memory of Woman, Life, Freedom
Historian Shahram Kholdi said the increased attention to schools cannot be separated from what happened inside them four years ago.
“We should remember that during the Woman, Life, Freedom movement we saw a huge wave of solidarity with this movement, especially in girls' schools in Iran,” he said.
The nationwide protests in January served as another warning. “It was again a wake-up call, harkening back to Woman, Life, Freedom, that they have to control schools,” Kholdi said.
After the death of Mahsa Jina Amini in morality police custody in September 2022, protests spread into schools.
Videos showed schoolgirls removing their headscarves, chanting against the Islamic Republic and removing or defacing images of its leaders. Some were barely teenagers.
The protests turned schools into one of the most visible arenas of youth opposition to the Islamic Republic.
Kholdi argues that the significance of a Basij presence extends beyond ideological instruction. Schools can provide authorities with greater visibility into students and, through them, their families at a time of considerable social and economic discontent.
The Basij's role in policing students also has a history. Kholdi recalled his own high-school years, when Basij members searched students' backpacks each morning for what he described as “contraband cultural material.”
What stands out now, he said, is how far down the age ladder the attention appears to be moving.
The Islamic Republic's concern about losing younger Iranians predates the latest unrest and war. In a January 2025 interview with Iran International, Iran specialist Holly Dagres said the establishment was already looking beyond an increasingly alienated Generation Z.
“They've been actually looking at the next generation, which is Gen Alpha,” she said.
‘North Korea scenario’
Azizi sees the push into younger age groups as part of a broader argument within the establishment over how to respond to a society that has moved away from some of the ideological positions that have defined the Islamic Republic.
“The regime has been trying to sort of bolster its base amongst the youth because it's lost them and it knows they're the future,” Azizi said.
One tendency, he said, favors a return to a more rigid and intensely ideological state—what he described as a “North Korea scenario”—drawing on mass mobilization of its remaining supporters to reinforce mandatory hijab and Islamist social rules.
In that vision, the Basij becomes an instrument not only for building support but for imposing what Azizi called “societal submission.”
But he said such an approach carries its own risk.
“If the regime wants to go toward bringing back Iran to the 1980s and then North Korea,” Azizi said, such policies could “lead to more social protests and social resistance.”
That tension is now reaching further into Iran's classrooms.
During Woman, Life, Freedom, schoolgirls who had spent their entire lives under the Islamic Republic turned some of those classrooms into places of protest. Four years later, the children entering elementary school belong to an even younger generation.
The spread of Starlink could deliver the “final nail in the coffin” of Iran’s ability to control cyberspace, Deputy Communications Minister Mohammad Hafez Hakami said Wednesday, even as authorities seek to suppress the technology through arrests, seizures and criminal penalties.
Hakami said Starlink had fundamentally changed that equation. “Our control over cyberspace is no longer based on our domestic network. It is based on Starlink,” Hakami said.
He said officials had warned for more than two years that wider use of the satellite internet service could eventually render existing methods of controlling communications ineffective, but had failed to produce an adequate policy response.
“I sometimes joke that we might as well turn the Ministry of Communications and the Supreme Council of Cyberspace into amusement parks, because they will no longer serve any purpose,” Hakami said.
Iran has repeatedly restricted internet access during periods of unrest. Hakami said the government’s response has grown progressively more restrictive, from blocking a single platform in 2017 to shutting down internet access during the 2019 protests, blocking two major platforms after the 2022 protests and ultimately disconnecting the entire network during the bloody crackdown on nationwide protests in January 2026.
Starlink poses a challenge to that approach because its terminals connect to satellites rather than relying on Iran’s domestic telecommunications network.
Hakami said even measures such as mandatory mobile phone registration could become ineffective with Direct-to-Cell technology, which allows ordinary mobile phones to connect directly to satellites.
“I don’t want to create ‘Starlink-phobia,’ but nothing will remain of our ability to control cyberspace,” he said.
Arrests and seizures
Iranian authorities have intensified their crackdown on Starlink as its use has expanded. Iran’s Economic Security Police said in August that authorities had seized 997 Starlink devices and related equipment and arrested 163 people during the four months through July. Police also impounded 15 vehicles carrying the equipment.
The crackdown has extended to individual users and sellers. Two men from Bukan were sentenced to two years in prison each for buying and selling Starlink equipment.
Iran also criminalized unlicensed satellite internet equipment under legislation adopted in 2025. The law prohibits the use, possession, purchase, sale and import of devices such as Starlink and provides for prison terms and confiscation. It permits the death penalty for specified activities involving the equipment when carried out for espionage or to confront the state and the perpetrator is deemed an enemy force.
Amnesty International said Iran’s Intelligence Ministry announced in March that “hundreds” of Starlink devices had been seized. The rights group said authorities had portrayed the use of alternative satellite connections as potential espionage or collaboration with hostile states and threatened users with prosecution.
Death after Starlink-related arrest
The crackdown has also been linked to a reported death in custody.
Hesam Alaeddin, a 40-year-old man detained in Tehran over his alleged use of Starlink equipment to bypass an internet blackout, died after he was severely beaten by government agents, a source familiar with the case told Iran International in May.
Alaeddin had gone to a hospital to check on his brother, Hamid, who had been shot during protests, when some of his electronic devices were seized, according to the source.
A week later, he went to retrieve the devices and was arrested. Agents took him to his home for questioning and a search, where they severely beat him with various objects and he died, the source said. Authorities concealed his death and continued to treat him as a living detainee before eventually telling his family to collect his body.
Amnesty International later documented Alaeddin’s death but said the precise timing and circumstances remained unclear. The rights group said his arrest was connected to an investigation involving his brother and alleged possession of a Starlink device.
Despite the enforcement campaign, Hakami said Starlink had already reached a significant level of use in Iran and questioned whether existing policies could keep pace with the technology.
“Tell me: What policy have we adopted to protect the country against Starlink?” he said.
British Prime Minister Andy Burnham said on Wednesday there are “strong indications” Iran played a role in a suspected plot near RAF Fairford airbase used by US forces to carry out strikes on the Islamic Republic.
“But of course, it remains an ongoing, complex and serious police investigation,” he told BBC. “We are working closely with our colleagues in the United States of America.”
Five British men in their 20s were arrested on suspicion of terrorism and explosives offenses after three white vans were found near the base.
Police recovered petrol but found no viable explosives, and all five suspects were later released on bail as the investigation continued.
The base is home to the US Air Force’s 501st Combat Support Wing and also serves as a forward operating site for Air Force Global Strike Command.
Fairford has supported major US military operations, including the 1991 Persian Gulf War, the 2003 invasion of Iraq and this year’s US-Israeli strikes on Iran.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio subsequently said a foreign state was involved, without naming it, while President Donald Trump said the men had planned "big damage."
Iran has denied involvement. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) said in July that bases used for attacks on Iranian territory could be considered legitimate targets.
Before Burnham’s remarks, British authorities had not publicly linked the incident to Iran, though counter-terrorism police said they were investigating possible foreign state involvement, including whether proxies may have been “knowingly or unknowingly working on behalf of a foreign state.”
Police said Tuesday that petrol, but no improvised explosive device, was found in the vans used by the men. They also defended releasing the suspects on bail after criticism, including from Trump.
The Times reported that one suspect called emergency services shortly before his arrest, with investigators considering whether the incident was surveillance, a “dry run” or an attempt to send a message to the British government.
Britain said in January that its services had tracked more than 20 potentially lethal Iran-backed plots over the previous year targeting dissidents, journalists and members of the Jewish community.
In June, 24 Western governments accused Iran’s IRGC intelligence apparatus, the Quds Force and Iran’s intelligence ministry of plotting attacks in Europe, North America and Australia, including against Iranian dissidents and Jewish and Israeli interests.
An Iranian-American student who pressed Michigan Democratic US Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed to state his position on Iran’s Revolutionary Guards says he and his family have faced threats and harassment after a video of the exchange went viral.
At a University of Michigan town hall, Iman Dashti said his cousin had been pursued through the streets over her hijab and his uncle sentenced to death and given 50 lashes under the Islamic Republic, before asking whether El-Sayed stood “unequivocally against the IRGC.”
El-Sayed responded that he would “always stand with movements for freedom and democracy” and later told Dashti, “I want freedom and democracy for the people of Iran, no question,” while stressing that political change should come from Iranians themselves rather than through US-led regime change.
He did not directly answer Dashti’s question about whether he stood unequivocally against the IRGC.
Dashti told Iran International he shares El-Sayed’s opposition to US-imposed regime change, but said that was never the question he was asking.
“I never asked about regime change. I never asked about his stance on the war,” Dashti said. “I asked him about the people.”
“I wanted to hear from him. I wanted to hear that he stood with us, I really did want to,” he said. “If Abdul were to win, at least we’d have an advocate for the Persian people, for the American people in the US Senate.”
El-Sayed’s campaign has defended his response.
“As he noted in his response, Abdul will always stand with movements for freedom and democracy and he condemns government anti-free speech violence,” campaign spokesperson Roxie Richner told Fox News.
The campaign also reiterated El-Sayed’s opposition to US-funded regime-change wars.
Iran International separately contacted El-Sayed’s campaign seeking an interview or written response about the exchange and his position on the IRGC but did not receive a response before publication.
Threats after the exchange
Dashti said the atmosphere inside the town hall became tense, with audience members applauding when El-Sayed rejected US-led regime change, a position Dashti said he agreed with.
“The tension was very high in that room,” he said. “You could cut it with a knife.”
Since the exchange spread online, Dashti says he has received threats and that his friends and family have been targeted.
“Since that day, people have threatened me, doxxed my friends, even harassed my family,” he said in a video posted after the town hall.
Dashti told Iran International the past several days had been anxious but said the hostile reaction had also been accompanied by considerable support.
“For every negative comment I’ve gotten, for every negative sort of threat, I’ve gotten a lot of beautiful positive messages,” he said.
Scrutiny of Dashti’s politics
The attention has also brought scrutiny of Dashti’s own politics. He describes himself as a “proud Christian conservative,” belongs to the College Republicans and has previously met Mike Rogers, the Republican nominee running against El-Sayed in November.
Dashti said he does not work for Rogers and was not sent to the town hall on behalf of his campaign.
“Am I a Zionist plant? Do I work for the Rogers campaign?” he said in his follow-up video, recounting accusations circulating online. “I don’t work for anyone. I’m just a Persian student and my family was hunted in the streets of Iran.”
The son of Iranian immigrants, Dashti said he sees speaking about repression in Iran as a way of advocating for people who cannot freely do so themselves.
“The least I can do is give a voice to the people who literally don’t have a voice,” he said. “I love my people, my heritage. It’s a beautiful, beautiful culture.”
Washington designated the IRGC a Foreign Terrorist Organization in 2019. The force is a central part of the Islamic Republic’s security apparatus and has been involved in suppressing anti-government protests.
Dashti said the criticism has not deterred him from continuing to raise the issue during the remaining weeks of the Senate campaign.
“I’m going to keep going, whether that means showing up at future events, mobilizing friends,” he said. “This is just the beginning.”
Years in prison or hiding, suicide attempts and severe financial hardship are among the consequences of Iran’s imprisonment of people over unpaid financial obligations, according to an IHRDC report published Tuesday.
According to a report published Tuesday by the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center (IHRDC), the findings draw on 10 confidential interviews conducted between March 2024 and July 2026 with debtors and close relatives of people subjected to financial enforcement.
All requested anonymity because of the stigma and other risks associated with imprisonment for debt.
One case concerns a man identified by the pseudonym Borna, whose sister told IHRDC that he spent two years in hiding after falling behind on payments linked to a marital financial obligation of 300 gold coins. He attempted suicide by jumping from a fourth-floor building and later spent about three years in prison.
His sister said a trial court found that Borna lacked the means to pay and ordered his release, but an appellate court required him to first pay 14 gold coins in arrears. IHRDC cited the case as evidence that people recognized as unable to pay can nevertheless remain exposed to detention.
The report also recounts the case of a young woman who was arrested at about 16 for theft and remained imprisoned for nearly three years after completing her sentence because she could not repay 400,000 tomans, which the report put at about $400 at the time. According to testimony cited by IHRDC, she attempted suicide in prison by swallowing depilatory powder and suffered lasting internal injuries.
The individual accounts are set against official figures showing that an average of 10,087 people were held in “imprisonment until payment” for civil financial judgments on any given day in 2022-23, representing 4.3% of Iran’s average prison population. The figure excludes people held over blood money and those on day release.
IHRDC’s open-source database separately recorded at least 88,078 releases of imprisoned debtors across all 31 provinces between 2016 and 2026. The organization said available figures represent minimums and do not capture everyone affected by financial detention.
Under Article 3 of Iran’s Law on the Enforcement of Financial Judgments, a debtor can be imprisoned at a creditor’s request until the judgment is satisfied, a court accepts an insolvency claim or the creditor consents to release. IHRDC said people genuinely unable to pay can still face detention because of procedural and evidentiary barriers, including missed deadlines and difficulties securing witnesses, collateral or legal assistance.
Iran told the United Nations during its 2025 Universal Periodic Review that no one is imprisoned merely for failing to fulfill a contractual obligation and that detention is reserved for people who have the means to pay but refuse. IHRDC said its examination of the law, statistics and witness accounts found that assurance “does not hold.”
IHRDC called for abolishing imprisonment for genuine inability to pay and replacing it with measures including asset tracing, wage attachment and installment plans based on a debtor’s ability to pay, while retaining sanctions for proven fraud, concealment or deliberate refusal to pay despite having the means.