Exclusive: Regime's Directive to Journalists to Repeat 'Government Narrative' on Protester Killings

Voice of America has obtained exclusive information indicating that representatives from the security and governmental institutions of the Islamic Republic have requested journalists in two confidential meetings with managers and editors of non-governmental media in Tehran to repeat the official government narrative regarding the killings of protesters 'without any doubt' and to censor any independent accounts from families and eyewitnesses. These meetings took place while Iranian officials simultaneously intensified street repression, widely cut off the internet, and severely restricted access to independent narratives. According to a journalist who spoke with Voice of America, the first meeting was held on Wednesday, January 25, with the presence of 'S.', the deputy of the IRGC Intelligence, and the second meeting took place on the evening of Tuesday, January 1, with 'M.N.P.', an official from the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, and 'S' as a liaison from the Supreme National Security Council, to convey the message of Ali Larijani, the Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, regarding how to disseminate the government's desired news in non-governmental media in Iran. This source states that 'almost all non-governmental media and news outlets', including newspapers such as Shargh, Etemad, Arman, Setareh Sobh, and websites like Khabar Online, Jamaran, and Fararu, were present, while governmental media like IRNA, ISNA, Fars, and Tasnim are managed through a separate mechanism. The main focus of both meetings was controlling and homogenizing the casualty figures from the protests. The journalist reports that 'M.N.P.' emphasized, quoting Ali Larijani, that 'this figure is the one that will be officially announced' and no media should 'in any way' question it or say 'you have understated it.' According to him, representatives from the Supreme National Security Council and IRGC Intelligence insisted that media should only publish the official narrative regarding the number of casualties and set aside any questions or doubts about the actual toll. This source explains that in the initial scenario, media were asked to focus on a figure of about '700 people' and label this group as 'rioters' or 'terrorists', but in the subsequent scenario, which he states 'was announced by state television last night', the total number of deaths was introduced as around three thousand, and media were asked to refer to a significant portion of this number as 'martyrs'. He notes that security officials explained in the meeting that in the official statistics, many individuals who 'had no prior record of arrest or activity' were also included among the 'martyrs of the people' to enhance the government's narrative of 'victims of terrorism'. A significant part of the directives focused on silencing the voices of the victims' families and eyewitnesses. This journalist states that media were asked 'under no circumstances' to engage with the families of the deceased, not to answer their calls, and not to publish their accounts regarding how their loved ones were killed or detained. He emphasizes that media were warned that if they published any material that questioned the official statistics or referenced the field narratives of families and witnesses, they would face 'consequences', and there is a risk of confiscation and legal action. According to this journalist, the confiscation of the 'Ham-Mihan' newspaper was justified within this framework as 'extremism' by officials. The source also discusses the coordinated use of internet tools by the regime to eliminate independent narratives. He states that officials emphasized in the meeting that they were told 'we will not connect the internet for now', and Google would not be allowed to index independent news sites, effectively ensuring that only governmental media like IRNA, ISNA, Tasnim, and Mehr would be visible in global searches. He mentions that independent media have been forced to publish their content on domestic domains that are visible to users without circumvention tools, but 'Google does not read them', thus rendering non-governmental narratives invisible on a global scale. This description aligns with independent reports about a 'digital blackout' in Iran; reports indicate that since January 7, 2024, international internet access has been almost completely cut off, with only the national information network remaining partially active, making access to foreign websites and open-source services virtually impossible for the majority of users. According to this journalist, government officials in this meeting implicitly stated that this situation would continue at least until the future when the government deems 'appropriate security conditions' to exist. The declared goal: monopolizing the image of Iran. The journalist states that the overall message from the representatives of IRGC Intelligence, the Supreme National Security Council, and the Press Deputy in these two meetings was that 'only one image of Iran should be published; the same image that the government constructs of itself' and 'for now, no other image, neither of the protesters nor of the actual situation in the country, is to leak out.' He recounts that the continuation of the internet cut and severe communication restrictions was explicitly introduced as a tool to ensure this monopoly, and media were told that decisions regarding lifting or continuing these restrictions would depend on the level of 'crowding' in the streets in the coming days. The internet cut and casualty statistics in official and non-official sources. Since January 7, 2024, Iran has faced one of the most severe internet cuts in its history. The global network has been almost completely severed, and telephone and messaging communications have also experienced widespread disruptions at various times, with only limited and controlled access to the internal network remaining for some users. Reports from internet monitoring organizations like NetBlocks and international infrastructure companies have described this situation as a 'nationwide blackout' aimed at limiting the dissemination of news about the bloody repression of protests. At the official level, Iranian officials recently announced for the first time a figure of about 3,117 deaths, stating that the majority of these individuals were 'innocent' or 'martyrs' who lost their lives during the unrest. This figure is significantly lower than estimates from independent organizations and human rights sources, which, based on hospital data, reports from doctors and activists, speak of thousands to tens of thousands of deaths; some reports have indicated at least several thousand casualties just in the first two days of the internet cut, and various sources, from human rights organizations to UN special rapporteurs, have suggested that the total toll may have exceeded twenty thousand. In such an environment, the narrative provided by this journalist from inside Iran to Voice of America presents a picture of systematic coordination among security institutions, governmental media, and the internet cut mechanism, aimed at homogenizing the narrative, concealing the true dimensions of the massacre, and silencing the voices of families and witnesses from the public sphere; a process that has severely limited the ability to verify and reflect the suffering of victims without free access to the internet and independent media. The nationwide protests that began on January 7 have been accompanied by the bloody repression of dozens of cities. The CBS news network estimates the number of casualties to be between 12,000 and 20,000, and the Iran Human Rights Organization has also confirmed the deaths of at least 3,400 individuals. While the internet blackout has lasted for 14 days and Iran's communication with the outside world remains largely severed, international organizations have warned that this deliberate policy is an attempt to conceal the scale of the massacre of protesters and prevent citizens from accessing free information. Donald Trump, the President of the United States, has repeatedly expressed his explicit support for Iranian protesters in recent weeks, warning the Islamic Republic and its repressive apparatus about the massacre of protesters, stating that should protesters be executed, the United States would take 'very decisive actions.' Following these warnings from President Trump to the Islamic Republic, the President of the United States on Friday, January 26, expressed gratitude for the cancellation of planned executions in Iran in a message on his Truth Social account. However, on Saturday, January 27, 2024, in an interview with Politico, he stated that the 'Ayatollah' is guilty for 'completely destroying his country' and 'it is time to seek new leadership in Iran.' He commented on Ali Khamenei, the leader of the Islamic Republic, saying, 'His guilt as the leader of a country is the complete destruction of the country and the use of violence at levels never seen before.' He added, 'For the country to be able to continue its work, even if this performance is at a very low level, the leadership must focus on properly managing its country - like what I am doing with the United States - and not kill thousands of people to maintain its power.' Ahmad Batebi, an international multimedia journalist at Voice of America.