Iranian regime could have 'murdered over 1000' since protests began: US

The United States said on Thursday the Iranian regimes could have murdered over 1,000 of its citizens in a crackdown against a popular protest against it that began last month.

"As the truth is trickling out of Iran, it appears the regime could have murdered over 1,000 Iranian citizens since the protests began," State Department Special Representative for Iran Brian Hook told reporters during a news conference here.

Protests broke out in Iran on November 15 after the government hiked fuel prices.

Hook said the United States has received more than 32,000 video footage of protestors through a secure site and they reveal the brutality of the regime, he said, adding the State Department is looking at each one of them.

Referring to some of the footage, Hook said that in Mahshahr, a city in southwest Iran, a number of Iranian demonstrators blocked a road when the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps or IRGC opened fire without warning, killing several people.

"Many of the protesters fled to nearby marshlands to escape. The IRGC tracked them down and surrounded them with machine guns mounted on trucks. They then sprayed the protesters with bullets. Between the rounds of machine-gun fire, the screams of the victims can be heard," he said.

In this one incident alone, the regime murdered as many as 100 Iranians and possibly more, he said. "We cannot be certain because the regime blocks information. Among those murdered are at least a dozen children, including 13 and 14-year-olds," Hook said.

When it was over, he said, the regime loaded the bodies into trucks. "We do not yet know where these bodies were taken, but we are learning more and more about how the Iranian regime treats its own people."