Khamenei says authorities 'must break the back of the seditionists'

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Saturday that authorities should “break the back of the seditionists,” and blamed U.S. President Donald Trump for the “victims” of a crackdown on anti-government demonstrations that has left thousands dead.

“We do not intend to drag the country into war, but we will not spare domestic criminals … and even worse than domestic criminals, international criminals, we will not spare them either,” he told supporters during a speech marking a religious holiday.

“By God’s grace, the Iranian nation must break the back of the seditionists, just as it has broken the back of sedition before,” he added.

The protests, initially triggered on Dec. 28 in Tehran by merchants demonstrating against the rising cost of living, gathered momentum on Jan. 8, openly challenging the Islamic Republic established in 1979. Authorities subsequently cut internet access, a move human rights groups say was intended to conceal the brutality of the crackdown.

Khamenei also accused U.S. President Donald Trump of being “guilty of the victims” who died during the unrest. “We hold the American president responsible for the victims, the damage, and the accusations he made against the Iranian nation,” he said.

“It was an American plot,” he claimed, adding that “the goal of the United States is to swallow Iran … to place Iran back under military, political and economic domination.”