Iran: Students join economic protests, president seeks talks

Protests over rising costs of living in Iran spread to several universities on Tuesday, semi-official media reported, as students joined shopkeepers and merchants in expressing dissatisfaction at currency devaluation and the connected costs.

The Fars news agency reported that hundreds of students demonstrated at four universities in the capital Tehran on Tuesday; other outlets said seven sites were involved.

Protests also broke out at the technology university in the central city of Isfahan and institutions in the cities of Yazd and Zanjan, Ilna and state-run IRNA reported.

President Masoud Pezeshkian had taken to social media late on Monday after major protests in Tehran to announce that he had asked his interior minister to arrange talks to discuss the "legitimate demands" of protesters and to work on a government response.

"We have fundamental actions on the agenda to reform the monetary and banking system and preserve the purchasing power of the people," Pezeshkian said, after Iran's rial currency has lost almost half its value against the US dollar during the course of 2025.

Inflation hit 42.5% in December amid the pressure of US and European sanctions and the potential threat of further Israeli strikes in the aftermath of the brief conflict in June.

Iranian media quoted government spokesperson Fatemeh Mohajerani as saying on Tuesday that authorities "recognize" the protesters.

"We hear their voices and we know that this ⁠originates from natural pressure arising from the pressure on people's livelihoods," she said.

Meanwhile, the government also gathered a large crowd of its flag-waving supporters in the capital on Tuesday for one of its regular demonstrations in support of the regime.

The demonstrations are the first major show of public dissent since June's brief war with Israel, which had prompted widespread public expressions of patriotic solidarity.

Iran's economy had been struggling for years following the reimposition of US sanctions in 2018. UN sanctions coming back into force, after the failure of efforts to restart nuclear disarmament talks, in September added further pressure.

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The currency slid to roughly 1.4 million rials to the US dollar on Tuesday, according to private exchange platforms, having started the year at 817,500 to the dollar.

On Monday, the central bank chief resigned. Iranian media reported that the government's recent economic liberalization policies had put pressure on the open-rate rial market, where ordinary Iranians buy foreign currency.

Iran has a history of widespread public protests in recent years, albeit with them typically put down by the government and security forces. Recent examples include demonstrations over rising prices of core products including bread in May 2022.

This was followed by the unrest starting in late 2022 and ending in early 2023 triggered by the death of a young Iranian Kurdish woman, Jina Mahsa Amini, in the custody of Iran's notorious "morality police," which enforces strict dress codes.