How many deaths in Iran? Experts say toll is high but hidden in secrecy
USA TODAY
The figures vary from as few as 3,000 according to the regime in Tehran to over 32,000 reported by President Donald Trump.
Images of piles of body bags and videos of government agents in Iran firing indiscriminately on protesters opposed to the country’s repressive regime have left experts and world leaders alike struggling to investigate just how many people the ayatollah’s forces have killed in recent weeks.
Reports vary widely. Officials in Tehran have reported over 3,000 deaths, including government troops killed by protesters. President Donald Trump on Feb. 20 shared an estimate of over 32,000.
Uncovering the true number of deaths, experts say, will be difficult given the supreme leader’s stranglehold on information in Iran. But the figure is likely many times higher than Ayatollah Ali Khamenei admits, the experts say.
"I would put the minimum estimates to be 5,000 plus," Mai Soto, the United Nations’ special rapporteur on Iran, said in an interview with ABC Australia. Soto noted 5,000 dead is a "conservative" or "the minimum" estimate. Other credible estimates, she said, indicate as many as 20,000.
Protests began at the end of December over inflation and turned into demonstrations against the nation’s repressive government. Islamic Revolutionary Guard troops, state police and other government agents responded fiercely on Jan. 8 and 9, firing at close range using guns loaded with metal pellets on protesters and since then the government has threatened capital punishment for people involved.
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