Iran warns Trump to not take motion in opposition to Khamenei : NPR

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AP/Workplace of the Iranian Supreme Chief DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Iran on Tuesday warned Donald Trump to not take any motion in opposition to the nation's Supreme Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, days after the U.S. president known as for an finish to Khamenei's almost 40-year reign.

"Trump is aware of that if any hand of aggression is prolonged towards our chief, we not solely reduce that hand but in addition we are going to set fireplace to their world," Gen. Abolfazl Shekarchi, a spokesman for Iran's armed forces, mentioned.

The feedback got here after Trump described Khamenei in an interview with Politico on Saturday as "a sick man who ought to run his nation correctly and cease killing folks," including that "it is time to search for new management in Iran."

Stress between the U.S. and Iran has been excessive since a violent crackdown by authorities on protests that started over Iran's ailing financial system on Dec. 28. Trump has drawn two pink traces for the Islamic Republic — the killing of peaceable protesters and Tehran conducting mass executions within the wake of the demonstrations.

The united statesAbraham Lincoln, which had been within the South China Sea in current days, had handed via the Strait of Malacca, a key waterway connecting the South China Sea and Indian Ocean, by Tuesday, ship-tracking information confirmed.

A U.S. Navy official, talking on situation of anonymity, mentioned the plane service and three accompanying destroyers had been heading west.

Whereas naval and different protection officers stopped wanting saying the service strike group was headed to the Center East, its present heading and site within the Indian Ocean means its solely days away from shifting into the area.

It could not be first time lately {that a} service strike group deployed to the Pacific was moved to the Center East to handle instability within the area. The Abraham Lincoln was rerouted to the Center East in 2024. Final June, the united statesNimitz strike group was ordered to the area.

The dying toll from the protests has reached not less than 4,519 folks, the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists Information Company mentioned Tuesday. The company has been correct all through the years of demonstrations and unrest in Iran, counting on a community of activists contained in the nation that confirms all reported fatalities. The Related Press has been unable to independently verify the determine.

The dying toll exceeds that of some other spherical of protest or unrest in Iran in a long time, and recollects the chaos surrounding the 1979 revolution that introduced the Islamic Republic into being. Though there have been no protests for days, there are fears the quantity might improve considerably as data progressively emerges from a rustic nonetheless underneath a government-imposed shutdown of the web since Jan. 8.

Khamenei mentioned on Saturday that the protests had left "a number of thousand" folks useless and blamed america. It was the primary indication from an Iranian chief of the extent of the casualties.

Greater than 26,300 folks have been arrested, in keeping with the Human Rights Activists Information Company. Feedback from officers have led to fears of a few of these detained being put to dying in Iran, one of many world's prime executioners.

Nationwide police chief Gen. Ahmad Reza Radan has mentioned these turning themselves in would obtain extra lenient therapy than those that do not.

"Those that had been deceived by overseas intelligence companies, and have become their troopers in follow, have an opportunity to show themselves in," Radan mentioned in an interview carried by Iran's state tv on Monday. "In case of give up, undoubtedly there shall be a discount in punishment. They've three days to show themselves in."