The final time Ottawa resident Mahnoosh Naseri spoke to her father, he had determined to take to the streets of Tehran to protest the Iranian regime.
It was Jan. 7 and Iranians fed up with the corruption, financial mismanagement and repressive non secular guidelines of the regime had been rallying like by no means earlier than.
Two days later, her father left his condominium to hitch the demonstrators and by no means got here house. It took his household 4 days to search out him. He had been shot useless.
“He didn’t care anymore about his security. What he cared about was the way forward for Iranian youngsters,” Naseri informed World Information in an interview.
Virtually a month after Iranians mounted their greatest problem to the Islamic regime that has dominated them for a half century, the stunning dying toll is changing into extra clear.
The protests started in late December and had been rising by the day on Jan. 8, when Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran’s deposed Shah, known as for mass demonstrations.
Thousands and thousands marched in main cities, reassured by U.S. President Donald Trump, who had vowed that if Iran killed protesters, he would “come to their rescue.”
The rebellion was the biggest because the 1979 Islamic revolution, and fighters loyal to Supreme Chief Ali Khamenei responded with predictable violence. Activists say tens of 1000’s could have been killed.
To cowl up the carnage, the regime lower off web entry, however because the our bodies have piled up, households like Naseri’s have been discovering out simply how unhealthy it was.
Hossein Naseri, seen right here in Canada in 2025, was killed by Iran’s regime forces on Jan. 9.
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“This has touched lots of people in the neighborhood,” mentioned Ali Ehsassi, an Iranian-Canadian and the Member of Parliament for the Willowdale driving in Toronto.
Ehsassi mentioned he had been listening to from neighborhood members whose pals and kinfolk had been detained or killed, and that Jan. 8 and 9 had been “notably bloody.”
Whereas he didn’t know the Canadian authorities’s casualty estimates, the regime’s personal figures imply it ranks as one of many bloodiest confrontations of its sort in trendy historical past.
“I’ve little doubt that the quantity of people that have died may be very, very excessive, even by the requirements of the Iranian regime,” the MP mentioned in an interview.
In current interviews, World Information spoke to Iranian-Canadians concerning the destiny of these near them who participated within the anti-regime occasions of Jan. 8 and 9.
“Slowly we discovered the reality, and the reality was a bloodbath had taken place,” mentioned Azam Jangravi, a tech business skilled in Toronto.
Among the many casualties had been 10 members of the family, Jangravi mentioned, together with one who was shot within the chest at an illustration in Iran’s third-largest metropolis, Esfahan.
The relative didn’t die at first however was afraid to hunt medical assist as a result of the safety forces had been trolling hospitals to arrest protesters, she mentioned.
After hiding in a home for 2 days, he succumbed to his accidents, mentioned Jangravi, who fled Iran after she was convicted of exhibiting her hair in public.
Muhammad Reza Madani was killed by Iranian safety forces, in accordance with his household in Ottawa.
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One other Iranian-Canadian, Pieman Azimi, mentioned his nephew, a 20-year-old mechanic, had been gunned down throughout the demonstration.
His household searched police stations and hospitals for a day till discovering him among the many sea of our bodies, mentioned Azimi, who lives in Ottawa.
One other Ottawa resident described the capturing of a good friend, who survived a bullet to the waist. Later, the good friend informed her how the suppression ways had escalated.
“The primary two days, they had been capturing with paintballs,” mentioned Nona Dourandish. “After which they determined to usher in navy powers and their particular items.”
The authorities used drones to watch the town, and when a crowd gathered to chant anti-regime slogans, gunmen had been shortly on the scene, she mentioned, relaying her good friend’s account.
“He mentioned principally they had been capturing folks of their face, of their chest, so they’d not rise up. So they’d not survive,” Dourandish mentioned.
A retired accountant, shot useless
Naseri was near her father, Hossein. “I can’t consider that my dad is gone,” she mentioned. Tougher nonetheless to consider was that he was amongst so many killed that day.
When Naseri was rising up in Tehran, she mentioned she was repeatedly taken into custody for violating the regime’s strict costume code for ladies.
Her infractions included not protecting all her hair with a scarf and carrying shirts and pants that had been deemed too quick or too tight, she mentioned.
Following the regime’s brutal crackdown towards ladies’s rights advocates in 2022, she joined her brother in Ottawa in September 2023.
Hossein Naseri, seen right here in Ottawa final yr, joined the protests in Iran and was shot useless, members of the family mentioned.
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A 73-year-old retired Tehran accountant, her father visited her in Ottawa final summer time. He spent three months within the capital, attending her wedding ceremony and her brother’s commencement ceremony.
“I’m so glad that I had the probability to indicate him some cities in Canada. He actually cherished the character right here, the museums and the liberty,” Naseri mentioned.
Though he disliked the Islamic authorities, Hossein had beforehand shunned collaborating in protests, fearing that it may influence his two youngsters.
However early final month, Naseri spoke to him on WhatsApp, and he had determined that it was time to exit to assist the demonstrations.
“He informed me, ‘I do know you might be secure. You might be there. There is no such thing as a hazard for you two. And proper now I be at liberty to go and, like others, ask for what we would like,’” she mentioned.
Hossein left house at about 7 p.m. on Jan. 9, she mentioned.
Movies and eyewitness testimony amassed by Amnesty Worldwide present that, on that evening, safety forces positioned themselves on rooftops and opened fireplace.
The “lethal crackdown” was carried out primarily by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and Iranian police, the human rights group mentioned.
Hundreds died, making final month “the deadliest interval of repression by the Iranian authorities in many years of Amnesty’s analysis,” in accordance with the group.
Anti-government protest in Tehran, Iran, Jan. 9, 2026. (UGC by way of AP, File).
Naseri started to fret when she didn’t hear from her father. She despatched a message to a good friend who had web entry. Per week later, her aunt known as.
The household had searched by way of our bodies till discovering Hossein. He had been shot in the principle artery in his leg, his daughter mentioned.
Speaking together with her household has been a problem, amid fears that worldwide calls are being monitored. Naseri nonetheless is aware of little or no about what occurred, however she believes her father may have been saved had made it to a hospital.
She blames the Revolutionary Guard, whose mission is to defend the Islamic authorities from each inner and exterior threats. “The IRGC has lengthy expertise killing protesters.”
The Mujahedin-e-Khalq, an anti-regime militant group, introduced Hossein’s dying, calling him one of many “martyrs of the heroic nationwide rebellion.”
Canada joined Australia and the European Union on Jan. 9 in condemning “the killing of protestors, the usage of violence, arbitrary arrests, and intimidation ways by the Iranian regime towards its personal folks.”
However Deputy Conservative chief MP Melissa Lantsman mentioned the federal authorities needed to do greater than difficulty statements.
“Canada should exploit the regime’s fragility,” she mentioned in a press release to World Information that known as on the federal government to arrange a registry for these engaged in international interference.
She additionally urged Ottawa to expel members of Iran’s regime who’ve arrived in Canada, and to “work with allies to maintain info flowing freely to the courageous Iranian folks.”
“Something can be a step above nothing.”
Iran’s Supreme Chief Ali Khamenei at a commencement ceremony for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Tehran, Oct. 13, 2019. Picture by SalamPix/ABACAPRESS.COM.
Liberal MP Ehasassi mentioned the federal government was engaged on a collective response along with allies, and that Canada had already listed the IRGC as a terrorist group.
However Ehsassi mentioned Canada has been “effectively forward” of different international locations in adopting measures towards Iran, together with banning senior regime members from the nation.
Final week, the European Union adopted swimsuit, sanctioning the Revolutionary Guard, saying that “Repression can’t go unanswered.”
“Our officers in numerous departments are in contact with one another, deciding what there may be that we will probably do,” Ehsassi mentioned. “Clearly, I want to see us do much more. I believe the Iranian-Canadian neighborhood want to see that,” he mentioned.
“And I’ve each confidence that there are going to be a set of measures.”
The U.S. has been transferring navy belongings to the Center East, and on Monday, Trump warned Iran of “unhealthy issues,” however he has to this point shunned an assault and Khamanei mentioned an American strike would set off a regional struggle.
Naseri thinks the period of an Iran run by extremist mullahs has come to an finish. “This protest reveals that the folks of Iran, they don’t settle for this regime anymore.”
“They don’t need it.”
Stewart.Bell@globalnews
