A man wielding a large knife or machete and wearing a white shroud was reportedly shot in the legs Monday trying to break into President Hassan Rouhani’s office on Tehran’s Pasteur Street.
“The assailant has been arrested and hospitalized. We are trying to identify the person and find out his motive,” Mohsen Hamedani, deputy governor of Tehran, reportedly told Iran’s Fars news agency.
Muslims who are ready and willing to sacrifice their lives often wear a white shroud.
It is unclear whether Rouhani was in the building at the time of the incident.
According to Mehr News Agency, the assailant is 35. Authorities are trying to discover his identity and motives.
The Independent reported: “Protests are held outside the government complex on Pasteur street on a regular basis over rising inflation and joblessness. In 2016, a miner covered himself in petrol and tried to set himself on fire in protest against his unpaid wages.”
Protests have rocked Iran since December 28. Calls of “Death to Rouhani” and “Death to the Dictator” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei have filled the streets of various cities.
Inflation and unemployment were part of the reason for the uprising. Many protesters, however, cited egregious human rights abuses and the Iranian regime’s meddling in the affairs of countries like Iraq, Libya, and Syria – while using money that could have gone to the ailing people to progress the regime’s export of terrorism – as main factors for the weeks of ongoing civil unrest.
According to Reuters, Iran’s rial also hit a record low against the U.S. dollar on Monday. The publication further noted that the Statistical Center of Iran found that Iran’s unemployment stood at 12.4 percent in this fiscal year, leaving approximately 3.2 million Iranians jobless. However, it is likely that number is far higher. Iran has a population of 80 million people.
Adelle Nazarian is a politics and national security reporter for Breitbart News. Follow her on Facebook and Twitter.
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