Eyewitnesses recall the scenes of suppression and bitter days many Iranians spend nowadays amid ongoing anti-government protests. Speaking to Euronews, they recount their personal experience from violence witnessed, to being shot at to losing loved ones.
Iran has been in a communications blackout since January 7th. All domestic telephone lines as well as internet connecting them to the outside world have been blocked by the theocratic government.
This complete communications ban coincided with a fierce crackdown on anti-government protesters in major Iranian cities, including the capital, Tehran.
A few days after the blackout, it was possible to make repeated calls from Iran and images of the harrowing scenes on the ground were transmitted across the border showing countless dead bodies following clashes with security forces.
Some news sources and human rights groups estimate the number of people killed in the protests at more than 12,000. The government rejects those figures, saying they're grossly overinflated to "dramatise" the situation and fulfil political agendas.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei also acknowledged in his speech on Saturday that several thousand people had been killed during the protests. News agencies, quoting Iranian officials, had the figures at a minimum of 5,000.
Iranians who live abroad have been anxiously following the news were able to, after days of complete cut-off, catch up with their families back home, albeit briefly.
Arham (pseudonym), who lives in a European country, said in an interview with Euronews that his sister's husband was the target of direct firing by security forces, while not participating in demonstrations. He was hit with tear gas canisters as he was closing up his shop, while accompanied by his child.
Arham says the canisters hit his sister's spouse in the forehead and chest, and was taken to hospital to undergo surgery. He is yet to be discharged from hospital.
“During the protests, a close friend of mine who attended a protest rally in the Narmak area was shot, but we have no news from him and his family's search to find him has been fruitless,” says Arham.
In a recorded voice note given to Euronews of a telephone conversation with his sister, we hear: “All people are sad, as soon as you meet someone you have tears in your eyes, things are getting worse, people are apparently living normally but as if we were attacked by zombies.”
According to Arham, on the day he was in the hospital to monitor his sister's spouse's condition (the name of the hospital is withheld), “in front of my eyes, three teenage girls aged 16-17 lost their lives to gunshot injuries.”
“We're all bad now” is the phrase that keeps repeating in all the short and laborious phone calls to home.
The Islamic Republic of Iran is demanding huge sums from their families to handover the bodies for burial. Arham says he and a number of others are raising money so they can help their neighbour in Tehran pay for the return of their daughter's lifeless body.
The protests began on December 9, with Tehran marketers striking and closing shops in protest at Iran's troubled economic situation, after the country's currency, the rial, plummeted to a record low and inflation continuing to hover above 40%.
It quickly spread to other cities in the form of anti-government protests.
In a speech, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei labelled the protesters "agitators" and called for immediate crackdown to disperse them.
Images released from Iran show morgues, such as Kahrizak, filled with corpses of those killed in the protests, signalling the severity of the the force used to quell the uprisings.
Among those killed were a large number of teenagers aged 15 to 16. The crackdown has been met with backlash from human rights organisations worldwide, and many countries, with Australia even closing its embassy in Iran in protest.
Tehran says terrorists have slipped into the crowd of protesters and are responsible for the killing. Iraqi officials, who US broadcaster CNN interviewed in a report, say nearly 5,000 members of groups affiliated with Hashd al-Shaabi, the Iranian-backed militant group aided in dispering the riots.
Many of them reportedly arrived in Iran on buses, disguised as pilgrims.