Iranian leaders offer citizens £5 a month to stop mounting protests

Iran's leaders have offered to pay every citizen £5 a month in a desperate ploy to try and quash the mounting social unrest spreading across the country.

The regime has offered to hand Iranians 10 million rial (£5.50) - the equivalent of the average Iranian daily salary -  in voucher form over the course of four months.

Iran has been rocked by its biggest and most violent anti-regime demonstrations in three years -  which reportedly started due to an acute economic crisis affecting the country's currency which has caused soaring inflation.

As the protests enter their eighth day, it is understood at least 19 demonstrators have been killed since the social unrest began.

This is despite a warning from President Donald Trump that no protesters should be shot.

Rather than using just force - as the brutal regime has done so in the past - Iran is hoping to quell the opposition through concessions. 

These include the most ambitious money distribution programmes in the country's history and a rare offer for protesters to air their grievances with Iran's Supreme Leader - Ali Khamenei.

The concessions suggest Iran's theocratic regime views the protests as a serious threat to their power.

Iran's President Masoud Pezeshkian announced the financial support at a government meeting yesterday.

In words reported by The Daily Telegraph, he promised that any potential price increases would be fully covered to preserve household purchasing power. 

The president said: 'Any problems or shortcomings in society are a direct result of actions - therefore, it is essential that stakeholders and implementers are involved in all aspects of decision-making.

 'Undoubtedly, direct interaction with the people - listening to their concerns, demands, and criticisms and working to persuade public opinion - plays a key role in reducing psychological and social pressures.'

He added that society cannot be 'appeased or calmed through coercion or improper methods'.  

Tehran has also been rocked by events across the Atlantic after Iran's close ally Venezuela saw their leader deposed in a US Military Operation.

Venezuela's now ex-President Nicolas Maduro is in being held in a New York on drug and narco-terrorism charges while Trump has claimed will run the Latin American country 'indefinitely'.

In recent days, Trump has also waded into the ongoing Iranian protests. 

In a post to social media on January 3 he wrote: 'We are locked and loaded and ready to go'.

The US has already showed its willingness to take military action, having bombed civilian, military and nuclear targets alongside the Israelis back in June.

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Responding to Trump's comments, top Iranian official Ali Larijani warned that US interference in domestic Iranian issues would amount to a destabilisation of the entire Middle East. Iran backs proxy ​forces in Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen.

And Iran earlier warns that 'all US bases and forces in the entire region' would become 'legitimate targets' if Washington intervenes in internal protests. 

The reported deaths mark a significant escalation in the unrest that has spread across Iran since shopkeepers began protesting last week. 

It comes at a critical moment for Iran's Islamic clerical rulers as Western sanctions hammer an economy hit by 40 per cent inflation and after Israeli and ‍U.S. airstrikes in ‍June targeted the country's nuclear infrastructure and military leadership.

Tehran has responded to the unrest with an offer of dialogue, an apparently conciliatory gesture alongside its heavy handed security response.

Government spokesperson Fatemeh Mohajerani said last Thursday that the authorities would hold a direct dialogue with representatives of trades unions and merchants, but without giving details.

HRANA said last week there was a heavy presence of security forces in cities, with arrests, shootings and clashes in some areas. State media said students were detained then released during the demonstrations.

Many Iranian social media ⁠users disputed the authorities' account of the death of a Basij paramilitary member overnight. A video widely shared online that Reuters could not immediately verify appeared to show protesters trying to get an injured person into an ambulance.

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The Basij is a volunteer paramilitary force loyal to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali ⁠Khamenei. It is affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, which on Thursday accused those involved in the unrest in Kuhdasht of 'taking advantage of the atmosphere of popular protests'. 

But across Iran both violent and quiet resistance to the theocratic regime are taking place. 

Merchants, shop owners and students in a number of Iranian universities have been demonstrating for days and closing major bazaars. The government shut down much of the country on Wednesday by declaring a holiday due to cold weather. 

Last week, a photo of a lone demonstrator defiantly sitting on the road in front of armed security forces drew parallels to the 'Tank Man' snap taken during the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests.

The photograph, shared widely by local media including broadcaster Iran International, shows a brave protester sitting on a Tehran street in an attempt to block armed police from riding their motorbikes down the road.

Authorities have in recent years quashed protests over issues ranging from high prices, droughts, women's rights and political freedoms, ‍often with tough security measures and extensive arrests.

However, ⁠President Masoud Pezeshkian has said he had asked the interior minister to listen to 'legitimate demands' of the demonstrators.

Iran's economy has been struggling for years as a result of U.S. and Western sanctions over Tehran's nuclear program. Regional tensions led to a 12-day air war with Israel in June, further straining the country's finances.

The Iranian rial lost around half its value against the dollar in 2025, with inflation ⁠reaching 42.5 per cent in December.