Pro-government rallies continue in Iran

Tens of thousands of government supporters have taken to the streets across Iran as authorities tried to project a sense of stability after a week of protests sparked deadly clashes and calls for the downfall of the Islamic Republic.

But even as state television aired footage shot from helicopters of the support for Iran's clerically overseen government, videos emerged showing the anti-government unrest that has swept major cities has also spread to the countryside in the nation of 80 million people.

At least 21 people have been killed in the unrest and hundreds more have been arrested by authorities. Demonstrators' videos corresponded with Associated Press reporting from outside of Iran, though individual activists remain unreachable and the protests for now appear leaderless. It was not clear if new protests were held Wednesday or if the videos showed earlier events.

The protests began December 28 in Mashhad, Iran's second-largest city and a bastion for hard-liners, initially focusing on Iran's flagging economy and rising food prices. Now, they've morphed into demands for wholesale change in Iran's theocratic government.

On Wednesday, state TV reported pro-government demonstrations in dozens of cities and towns, including Ahvaz, the capital of the oil-rich province of Khuzestan, the Kurdish town of Kermanshah in the country's west and Qom, the religious capital of Shiite Islam in Iran.

All those cities have seen protests in recent days.

Some demonstrators also held aloft pictures of President Donald Trump with a bright red "X" through his face. Trump has tweeted several times in support of the protests, comments that have angered many Iranians given his travel ban barring them from getting US visas, as well as his comments over the nuclear deal.

The 2015 agreement, in which Iran curbed its nuclear activities in exchange for the lifting of some sanctions, remains popular in Iran, but one of the central grievances of the protesters is that average Iranians have seen few benefits from it.

The United Nations' high commissioner for human rights, meanwhile, called on Iran to investigate all deaths in the protests and act "with great care so as not to further inflame violence and unrest".

Iranian officials have downplayed the strength of the protests.