With Trump in office, Iranians mark anniversary of 1979 Islamic Revolution

Tens of thousands of Iranians marked the anniversary of the country's 1979 Islamic Revolution, the first such rally since President Donald Trump returned to the White House and restarted his maximum pressure campaign targeting Tehran.

The annual commemoration of the end of the rule of the American-backed Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and the creation of Iran's Shiite theocracy comes this year as deep uncertainty lingers across the country.

Iran faces crushing sanctions wrecking its economy and the threat of more coming from Trump, even as the American president suggests he wants to reach a deal with Tehran over its rapidly advancing nuclear program.

Meanwhile, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Friday criticised proposed talks with the United States and described negotiations with America as "not intelligent, wise or honourable.

Khamenei also suggested that there should be no negotiations with such a government, though stopped short of issuing a direct order not to engage with Washington.

In Tehran, people carried flags, balloons and banners as they marched toward Azadi, or Freedom, Square in the Iranian capital despite sub-zero temperatures.

Alongside anti-American and anti-Israeli banners with slogans like Death to America and Death to Israel", demonstrators also carried images of Khamenei, who has final say on all state matters.

A demonstrator held up a poster reading, We are going to wipe out Israel.

Iran's military displayed replicas of some of its missiles at the square. People also took selfie photographers in front of a pickup truck carrying men wearing masks of Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu behind bars.

I know there are a lot of economic problems in the country, but I am here to say we will support our country regardless of threats by Trump and Israelis," said Mohsen Amini, a 48-year-old teacher.

Hamideh Zamani, a 31-year-old homemaker wearing a flowing black Islamic chador, attended the rally with her two children.

We will resist any threat by the West without any fear," she said. "We learned this from our fathers to devote ourselves for the cause of the Islamic Republic.

The celebration is also the first after President Masoud Pezeshkian came to power in July following the death of former President Ebrahim Raisi in a helicopter crash last May. Pezeshkian is scheduled to give a speech later for the crowd in Tehran.

Iranian state television aired commemorations at sites across the country, urging more people to turn out. The day, an official holiday, takes on a festival feel, with schools and government offices closed, and workers out in the streets.

The Islamic Revolution began with widespread unrest in Iran over the rule of the shah who, terminally and secretly ill with cancer, fled Iran in January 1979. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini then returned from exile and the government fell on February 11, 1979, after days of mass demonstrations and confrontations between protesters and security forces.

Later in April, Iranians voted to become an Islamic Republic, a Shiite theocracy with Khomeini as the country's first supreme leader.

Months later, when the United States allowed the shah into the country for cancer treatment in New York, anger boiled over in Tehran leading to the takeover of the US Embassy in November 1979 by militant students. The subsequent 444-day hostage crisis at the embassy in Tehran kindled decades of enmity.