(Yahoo! News)
Amir Havasi November 22, 2019
Tehra - Iran's Basij militia said unrest sparked by fuel price hikes amounted to a "world war" against Tehran that was thwarted, and blamed the United States, Saudi Arabia and Israel.
Washington imposed sanctions on Iran's telecommunications minister Friday for restricting internet access during the unrest.
The protests erupted across the sanctions-hit country on November 15, after the price of petrol was raised by as much as 200 percent.
Authorities said they had arrested about 100 leaders of the protests in which police stations were attacked, petrol pumps torched and shops looted.
"A full-fledged world war against the system and the revolution was born and fortunately the child died at the moment of birth," said Brigadier General Salar Abnoosh, a deputy head of the Islamic volunteer militia.
Quoted by semi-official news agency ISNA late Thursday, Abnoosh said interrogations had revealed a "coalition of evil" of "Zionists, America and Saudi Arabia" was behind the "sedition".
Officials have confirmed five deaths, while Amnesty International said more than 100 demonstrators were believed to have been killed and the real toll could be as high as 200.
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