Trump imposes tariffs as Iranians make first calls to outside world since violent crackdown

Iranians made their first calls to the outside world Tuesday since being shut off amid a crackdown on protests that a human rights group says has killed 2,000 people, as President Donald Trump slapped a 25% tariff on those doing business with the Islamic Republic.

Trump has upped the pressure on Tehran, warning that he may launch military strikes but remained open to negotiations. Iran also says it is open to diplomacy, while threatening the United States and Israel with retaliation if it is attacked.

Inside Iran, authorities had cut internet access and foreign phone calls, meaning information was scant about the government’s bloody response to demonstrations initially sparked by rising prices. Hundreds have been killed, activists said, with video showing bodies lined up outside a morgue near Tehran, surrounded by their loved ones crying and screaming.

That blackout changed Tuesday, when many Iranians based abroad and the Associated Press news agency reported receiving calls from inside the country. The internet remained down, and calls were not able to be made into the country from outside, the news agency said.

Those who called the AP described a heavy security presence in central Tehran, with riot officers standing at all major intersections, wearing helmets and body armor, and carrying batons, shields, shotguns and tear gas launchers, the news agency said.

This presence involved the Revolutionary Guard’s all-volunteer Basij force as well as plainclothes security officials, the witnesses told the AP. Banks and government offices had been smashed during the demonstrations and though shops were open there was little foot traffic, they said, according to the AP.

Though the theocratic regime claims to have restored order — through deadly force on protesters across the country, according to activists — it is coming under mounting international pressure.

On Monday, Trump said on Truth Social that he was announcing a tariff of 25% on imports from countries doing business with Iran.

Iran’s largest trading partners are China, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey and India. This would come on top of any existing tariffs the U.S. has placed on those countries.

Trump has repeatedly warned that the U.S. might intervene, including possible military action, if the killing of protesters continued.

A U.S. official with direct knowledge of events told NBC News that protests had spread to every Iranian province and that the crowds remained huge. The State Department has told Americans to leave the country.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he believed the Iranian regime was in its “final days and weeks,” and said the European Union was working on its own new sanctions.

The demonstrations were sparked by economic grievances as the rial currency crashed and inflation soared. They have now morphed into one of the biggest challenges the Islamic Republic has faced in its 47-year history, as thousands of people have taken to the streets to demand the end of the ruling clergy.

The crackdown took a bloody turn after the internet was shut off nationwide on Thursday, human rights groups reported, with hundreds of people reportedly killed within a few days, a level of violence that they said surpassed the previous round of protests in 2022 and 2023.

“There is much more violence and I think it has got to do with how threatened the Islamic Republic feels,” Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, director of the Norway-based group Iran Human Rights, told NBC News in a telephone interview.

As of Tuesday morning, the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) said that 2,000 people had been killed and nearly 17,000 others arrested. Authorities in Iran have not given an official death toll.

The death toll included 1,847 protesters, nine people under age 18 and 135 members of the Iranian Security Forces, according to the organization.

Citing “reliable” sources on the ground, U.N. rights office spokesperson Jeremy Laurence said “the number that we’re hearing is hundreds,” when asked about the death toll Tuesday.

Internet access was cut Thursday according to NetBlocks, an internet monitoring group, and the blackout has now lasted more than 108 hours. Some videos that were not previously seen have been circulating on social media, however, which NBC News has been able to geolocate to different cities around the country.

It is not clear when the footage was shot.

One video circulating on Monday showed a man lying on the street in Tehran, bleeding heavily from his abdomen amid huge crowds of protesters. Two men stand over him arguing whether he was shot by a “pellet” or “military-grade” weapon while a woman screams in horror.

Videos also showed violent confrontations outside the capital.

A video that circulated on Monday from the city of Urmia in northwest Iran shows a large crowd kicking and punching members of security forces wearing helmets, who in turn hit back with batons.

Protesters continued to call for the downfall of the regime. In a video filmed in Arak, western Iran, and circulating Sunday, the crowd chants, “This is the year of blood, Moosh-Ali will be overthrown,” a reference to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the highest authority in the country.

Iranian authorities attempted to downplay the momentum of the protests.

Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said that the situation was now “under total control.” He also told Al Jazeera that “the internet was only cut after we confronted terrorist operations, and realized that orders were coming from outside the country,” an allegation authorities have leveled against the U.S. and Israel without providing evidence.

And Khamenei said in a message that large government counter-demonstrations Monday were a sign of the strength of the Iranian people and a warning to the U.S. not to meddle in the country.

“This was a warning to American politicians to stop their deception and not rely on treacherous mercenaries,” he said, according to state media.