Iran’s President Tries to Assuage Anger as Protests Continue

A Lebanese activist holds a poster depicting deceased Mahsa Amini during a protest organized by feminist groups in support of women protesters in Iran, following Amini's death, outside the Lebanese National Museum in Beirut, Lebanon, 02 October 2022. (EPA)

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on Tuesday appealed for national unity and tried to allay anger against the country’s rulers, even as the anti-government protests that have engulfed the country for weeks continued to spread to universities and high schools.

Raisi acknowledged that the country had “weaknesses and shortcomings,” but repeated the official line that the unrest sparked last month by the death of a 22-year-old woman in the custody of the country’s morality police was nothing short of a plot by Iran’s enemies.