Iran’s president Hassan Rouhani has said people are free to protest in his first comments since widespread demonstrations against the government began. Students attend a protest at Tehran University (AP)He warned the protests must not be allowed to make the public “feel concerned about their lives and security”. Mr Rouhani also criticised US president Donald Trump over his tweets about the protest, saying he “has forgotten that he had called Iranian people ‘terrorists’ a few months ago”. Many in Iran are learning about the protests and sharing images of them through Telegram, a mobile phone messaging app popular among the country’s 80 million people. On Saturday, Telegram shut down one channel on the service over Iranian allegations it encouraged violence, something its moderator denied.

Source: Daily Mail December 31, 2017 07:18 UTC