Young Iranian lives cut short as world welcomed new year

As much of the world celebrated the start of a new year, night fell hard on three Western towns where the final hours of 2025 and the dawn of 2026 were marked not by celebration, but deadly gunfire.

The killings in Kuhdasht, Azna and Lordegan came before the government shut down internet access, cutting off communication with the outside world and plunging Iran into silence. The area home to Iran's marginalized Lur ethnic minority.

In those early hours, shock and horror spread through hushed calls and voice notes, as brief videos surfaced of blood-stained children of Iran — someone’s son, someone’s brother, someone’s loved one — all killed by security forces.

Sources who spoke to Iran International requested anonymity, fearing reprisals from authorities for speaking to the media.

Hessam Khodayarifard: a life snuffed out on New Year’s Eve

Hessam Khodayarifard was shot dead in the western Iranian city of Kuhdasht on the evening of New Year's eve. The 22-year-old was killed on Wednesday night, December 31, 2025, during a crackdown on protests, two family sources told Iran International.

Authorities initially refused to hand over his body and pressured the family to present him as a member of the Revolutionary Guard’s Basij militia, relatives said. The claim was later publicly rejected by Hessam’s father, who spoke at his son’s funeral after the body was eventually returned.

But his burial brought no peace. Mourners gathered in large numbers, chanting anti-government slogans. Confrontations erupted as security personnel moved in, turning the funeral into another site of repression where grief and anger were met with force.

Shayan Asadollahi: the family’s only provider

On New Year’s Day, gunfire cut through the night in Azna in Iran’s western Lorestan province, where Shayan Asadollahi was shot dead. He was 28.

A relative told Iran International that Shayan was killed as he and a group of other protesters were returning home from a demonstration. Several military pickup trucks belonging to the Revolutionary Guard attacked the group, the source said, and security forces opened fire using military-grade weapons.

A live round struck Shayan in the abdomen according to photographs verified by Iran International. At least two other protesters were also killed during the same crackdown, the source added. Revolutionary Guards-affiliated Fars News later reported that three protesters had been killed in Azna.

Shayan was a barber, known in his community for working long hours to support his family. About a year earlier, his father and uncle had both died in an accident, the source said, leaving Shayan as the family’s sole breadwinner.

Reza Moradi: a child killed in the protests

Another victim from Azna was still a child.

Reza Moradi was 17 — the eldest child in his family which hails from the Abdolvand tribe, part of Iran’s Lur minority. He was shot on Thursday, January 1 during protests outside Azna’s central police station.

Security forces shot him twice, a source close to the family said: once in the head and once in the lower torso.

Video analyzed and verified by Iran International from that evening shows Reza unconscious on the ground, blood visible along the side of his head. Bystanders carried him to Valian Hospital in the nearby city of Aligudarz.

The hospital was placed under heavy security, the source said. Visits were banned. Only once — after repeated insistence — was Reza’s mother allowed to see her son briefly.

Reza died in hospital on the following Monday morning.

Authorities initially refused to hand over his body. When Reza was eventually returned and buried, a video at his grave site showed his younger brother clinging to the fresh earth in tears.

Reza had dropped out of school to help support his family, working as an apprentice in auto body repair and paint. His father is a laborer, and the family’s financial situation was dire, the source said.

Sajjad Valamanesh: grief and coercion

In neighboring Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari province, home to Bakhtiari Lur communities and about a three-hour drive southeast of Azna, authorities followed up another deadly shooting with further crackdowns.

In the city of Lordegan, Sajjad Valamanesh, a 20-year-old protester, was killed after being shot by security forces during demonstrations on Thursday, January 1, sources close to the family told Iran International.

The violence did not end with his death. Authorities repeatedly contacted Sajjad’s relatives in the days that followed, including calls from the Revolutionary Guard’s Intelligence Organization, a source close to the family said.

His father was pressured into giving an interview aired by state media in which he called for an official crackdown on "rioters," but the source said he did so only to secure the release of Sajjad’s body for burial.

Sajjad was not a member of the Basij and was a monarchy supporter, the source said.

He was buried on Friday with a large crowd attending his funeral.

Witness to the fate of the boy in a blue T-shirt

A 20-year-old witness who was present at the protests in Azna said he saw security forces shoot a teenager who looked “no more than 15 years old” on a road near the city’s main police station, where protesters had gathered on January 1.

“I saw them with my own eyes,” he said. “Security forces shot the boy, and he fell into a roadside drainage ditch.”

A group of protesters rushed to help him, he said. “But he was not moving anymore.”

The witness said the scene stayed with him.

“After seeing what I saw, I just could not take it anymore,” he said. “So I went back to the protests the next day as well.”

In messages sent shortly before the internet was shut down, the witness said he feared the world would never know what was happening in his hometown.

“Maybe it does not matter to the world,” he said, “because Azna is so small.”

“But the truth is that Lurs and Bakhtiaris have been deeply harmed by this wretched regime, even though this land is rich and full of resources,” he added.

“For us, it is already over,” he said. “I only wish that the lives of the next generation will be more beautiful.”

Before contact was cut, he made a final plea: “Please tell our stories,” he said. “Please tell the world what they did to my people.”

Four names, countless others remain unknown

These four names represent only a fraction of what unfolded in those days. They are among the few cases Iran International was able to document in detail.

Eyewitnesses and medics told Iran International the preliminary death tolls since protests began on Dec. 28 had ramped up in recent days to up to 2,000 people.

As an internet shutdown entered its fifth day, cutting off Iranians from the world and silencing independent reporting, the scale of the violence and suffering remained unknown.

Why Moscow may be central to Tehran's struggle for survival

Jan 12, 2026, 19:45 GMT

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Clément Therme

As Tehran faces its sharpest internal challenge since the 2022 Woman, Life, Freedom protests, the ruling elite’s ability to withstand sustained popular protests now rests not only on domestic coercion but increasingly on backing from Moscow.

What began in late December 2025 as protests over economic hardship—initially centered on Tehran’s bazaar and spreading through strikes—has since transformed into a far broader uprising, with demonstrators increasingly calling for an end to theocratic rule.

The unrest has been met with sweeping force, including mass arrests and the use of live ammunition, as authorities imposed near-total internet blackouts to obscure the scale of the crackdown.

Western governments have hardened their stance as the scale of the crackdown has become clearer, with US President Donald Trump vowing to hit Iran “very hard” if repression continued.

In this environment, Russia has remained persistent in its backing of Tehran.

A Times report last week even suggested that supreme leader Ali Khamenei might flee to Russia should his rule be seriously threatened.

While such scenarios cannot be entirely dismissed, they remain speculative and, above all, ideologically improbable.

Khamenei’s legitimacy is deeply rooted in his personal commitment to the ideological tenets of the Islamic Revolution and to the principle of revolutionary endurance.

This stance sharply differentiates him from other segments of the Islamic Republic’s establishment, notably economic and technocratic elites, for whom exit options and external safeguards may constitute a rational form of risk management.

Whether grounded in concrete planning or not, the persistence of such narratives nonetheless underscores how closely external partnerships—especially with Russia—are now perceived to be intertwined with the regime’s internal resilience and survival calculations.

The perception that Moscow backs repression—and offers sanctuary if it fails—may be influencing the calculations of Iran’s ruling elite, hardening the loyalists’ resolve while quietly expanding the exit options available to those at the apex of power.

Material support

Moscow's backing reflects not merely tactical convenience but a deeper strategic convergence rooted in shared opposition to Western norms of governance and intervention.

For Russia—strained by its war in Ukraine and declining influence elsewhere—Iran represents one of the few remaining pillars of resistance to what the Kremlin portrays as an increasingly assertive liberal international order.

Material cooperation lies at the core of this relationship.

While there is no publicly confirmed reporting of Russian military airlifts tied directly to the current protest wave, the depth of the Moscow-Tehran partnership is evident in joint ventures such as Iran’s recent satellite launches aboard Russian rockets and a series of long-term bilateral cooperation agreements.

Together, these developments form the geopolitical backdrop to the current unrest.

Learning repression

Officially framed as security and counterterrorism cooperation, the partnership has also involved political learning and technological convergence.

Iran’s security apparatus has increasingly adopted surveillance practices similar to those used by Russia to manage domestic dissent, including facial-recognition technologies, large-scale data aggregation and advanced communications monitoring that allow security forces to identify and disrupt protest networks with greater precision.

This convergence is reinforced by doctrinal exchanges and intelligence coordination involving the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Russian experience in sanctions evasion, electronic warfare and information control has proved valuable to Tehran as it seeks to preserve coercive capacity under mounting economic pressure.

Moscow’s support has become an increasingly important component of Tehran’s ability to contain a protest movement that challenges not only economic governance but the ideological foundations of the Islamic Republic.

Elite calculations

That external backing does not affect all factions within Iran’s power structure equally.

Tehran’s most ideologically committed forces—particularly within the IRGC and the security services—are widely expected to resist collapse at almost any cost.

For these actors, collapse would not simply mean loss of office but could entail prosecution, exile or worse. Their commitment to repression is therefore existential, reinforced by decades of indoctrination and deeply entrenched interests in a closed political system.

By contrast, Iran’s economic oligarchy, though deeply intertwined with the state, appears far less ideologically anchored.

Composed of business elites, semi-private conglomerates and networks enriched through privileged access to state resources, this group has long hedged its political bets.

As the crisis deepens, many are likely to seek exit strategies rather than confrontation. Unlike the ideological core, they possess the financial means and transnational connections to adapt quickly.

In the event of a fundamental political change in Iran, such actors would likely shift allegiances or secure settlement abroad.

Diplomatic protection

Beyond material assistance, Russia also provides Tehran with diplomatic shielding.

In multilateral forums, Moscow has consistently portrayed Iran’s repression as a legitimate exercise of sovereignty in response to foreign-backed destabilization.

This posture has taken on renewed urgency following the dramatic detention of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro by US forces—a development that sent shockwaves through governments closely aligned with Russia.

Maduro’s removal represented a setback for Moscow, depriving it of a partner whose geographic proximity to the United States offered a rare opportunity to project influence in Washington’s immediate neighborhood.

Iran’s strategic value to Russia is significant but different. While Tehran’s regional reach and energy leverage matter, its geography does not offer Moscow comparable proximity to US power.

As a result, Russia’s investment in Iran—though politically and symbolically important—appears constrained by a lack of capacity to challenge American influence within its own hemisphere.

Russia has nonetheless intensified its diplomatic defense of Tehran, blocking or diluting resolutions on human rights abuses and portraying Iranian protests as externally engineered “color revolutions.”

Shaping Tehran’s calculus

Russian state media has reinforced Tehran’s preferred narrative, emphasizing sanctions and alleged foreign interference while downplaying corruption, elite predation and long-standing structural mismanagement.

Equally significant is narrative coordination through non-Western platforms such as BRICS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, where Russia and Iran have worked to recast unrest as foreign-driven destabilization, emphasizing sovereignty, non-intervention and resistance to “hybrid warfare.”

By signaling that diplomatic backing—and potentially sanctuary—remain available, Moscow reinforces the resolve of ideological hardliners while quietly widening the options available to those at the apex of power.

In this sense, Iran’s internal crisis has become embedded in wider international security networks.

For Moscow, supporting Tehran is not only about regional influence but about defending the principle that political systems can withstand sustained popular challenge through transnational cooperation.

As protests in Iran continue with no clear resolution, their outcome will resonate far beyond the country’s borders, testing the balance between state resilience and popular sovereignty in an increasingly polarized international order.