TEHRAN: Iran warned of a tough crackdown on Sunday against demonstratorsposing one of the boldest challenges to its clerical leaders sincenationwide unrest shook the Islamist theocracy in 2009.

How serious are the protests?

Political protests are rare in Iran, where security services are pervasive.And yet tens of thousands of people have protested across the country sinceThursday. The demonstrations are the biggest since unrest in 2009 thatfollowed the disputed re-election of then-President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

They began in Iran’s second city of Mashhad in the northeast on Thursdayand spread to Tehran and other urban centers. Iranians vented their angerover a sharp increase in prices of basic items like eggs, and a governmentproposal to increase fuel prices in next year’s budget.

Some protesters also vented their rage over high unemployment and savingsthat were lost after investments in unlicensed credit and financialinstitutions turned sour.

The demonstrations, initially focused on economic hardships and allegedcorruption, turned into political rallies. Anger was soon directed at theclerical leadership in power since the 1979 revolution, including SupremeLeader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the ultimate authority in Iran’s cumbersomesystem of dual clerical and republican rule.

How will the government respond?

The government’s main challenge is to find a way to suppress the uprisingwithout provoking more anger.

So far, while the authorities have threatened to take strong measures, inpractice they have largely been restrained. Although two protesters werekilled and hundreds arrested, many believe the police have shown someself-control throughout most of the demonstrations.

Iran’s National Security Council held urgent meetings and so far hasdecided to block social media and messaging apps to restrict the flow ofinformation and calls for demonstrations.

The state has a powerful security apparatus it can call upon. But so far ithas refrained from despatching the elite Revolutionary Guards, the Basijmilitia, and plain-clothed security forces who crushed the 2009 uprisingand killed dozens of protesters.

In the meantime, the government backed down on plans to raise fuel pricesand promised to increase cash handouts to the poor and create more jobs incoming years.

What are the main demands of protesters?

Iranians across the country want higher wages and an end to alleged graft.Many also question the wisdom of Iran’s foreign policy in the Middle East,where it has intervened in Syria and Iraq in a battle for influence withrival Saudi Arabia.

The country’s financial support for Palestinians and the Lebanese Shi‘itegroup Hezbollah also angered Iranians, who want their government to focuson domestic economic problems instead.

The wide spectrum of slogans showed that the wave of demonstrations cover arange of social classes who have different demands.

Unlike the unrest in 2009, the latest protests appear to be morespontaneous without a clear leader. This may be a more dangerous scenariofor authorities, because it means they cannot round up the figureheads, asolution that was employed in 2009.

Some demonstrators even shouted “Reza Shah, bless your soul”, a referenceto the king who ruled Iran from 1925 to 1941, and his Pahlavi dynasty wasoverthrown by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the Islamic Republic’s firstleader.

Has Iran had similar uprisings?

In the last decade, Iran has experienced small-scale demonstrations againsteconomic hardship or local environmental crises, and one nationwidepolitical uprising in 2009 against alleged election fraud.

But a widespread uprising against major political and economic issues wouldbe worrying for the Islamic Republic and far more difficult to contain.

Iran’s Supreme Leader managed to control the 2009 uprising, which coincidedwith Arab revolts in the region, after putting the opposition leaders underhouse arrest, but the new wave of demonstrations in Iran does not seemorchestrated.

That could make it more of a threat than past unrest in a country thatoften portrays the 1979 revolution as a revolt by the poor againstexploitation and oppression. Calls for an end to economic hardship areespecially sensitive for that reason.

Is the economic situation worse than before?

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani championed a nuclear deal with worldpowers in 2015 to curb Iran’s nuclear program in return for the lifting ofmost international sanctions.

However, Iranians have yet to see any benefits.

Unemployment stood at 12.4 percent in this fiscal year, according to theStatistical Center of Iran, up 1.4 points from the previous year. Youthunemployment reached 28.8 percent this year.

Economic indexes have improved under Rouhani’s government and the economyis no longer in dire straits.

Inflation dropped single digits for the first time after about a quartercentury in June 2016. Gross domestic product growth soared to 12.5 percentin the year through last March 20, although almost entirely due to a leapin oil exports.

However, growth has been too slow for an overwhelmingly youthfulpopulation, far more interested in jobs and change than in the Islamistidealism and anti-Shah republicanism of the 1979 revolution that the oldguard clings to.

Iran’s recovery has been slowed by tensions with the United States.President Donald Trump has raised the possibility that sanctions could bereimposed or new ones introduced.

How has the West reacted?

Trump, who has detailed a more aggressive approach to Tehran over itsnuclear program, tweeted that Iranians “are finally getting wise as to howtheir money and wealth is being stolen and squandered on terrorism,” and“will not take it any longer.”

Canada said it was encouraged by the demonstrations. British foreignminister Boris Johnson said on his Twitter page that it was “vital thatcitizens should have the right to demonstrate peacefully.” -Reuters