Iran's Interior Ministry has set up "monitoring committees" to keep tabs on public dissent following the nationwide protests that rocked Iran in 2017, 2018 and 2019 and threatened the very existence of the clerical regime. President Hassan Rouhani’s Interior Ministry said it has set up the monitoring committees attended by intelligence and security officials to boost security in the country.

Deputy Interior Minister for Security and Policing Hossein Zolfaghari told the administration-owned newspaper Iran that during the past year maintaining security has become more difficult because of economic hardship and the social implications of the Covid pandemic.

However, he described the country's situation as "stable" and explained that the monitoring committees have been set up based on an approval by the State Security Council to sort out "issues relating to various occupations and trade unions." During the past year, protest by workers, teachers, pensioners and various other groups continued as they demanded their unpaid wages and their dwindling purchasing power.

Zolfaghari stated that Iran's security and intelligence agencies assist the Interior Ministry in monitoring the overall situation in the country. He did not elaborate further, but several political observers inside and outside Iran have attested during that the fear of renewed unrest has been the main preoccupation of officials in recent months, particularly with the escalation of dissent and sporadic protest demonstrations.

The official, however, acknowledged that the committees are tasked with "preventing tensions." During the protests in 2018 and 2019 the Interior Ministry and its police force were the regime's first line of defense against protesters, but soon the police force controlled by the Ministry left the scene and called in the Revolutionary Guards and the Basij militia to suppress the protests.

Interior Minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli downplayed the death toll in the bloody November 2019 protests, saying that 200 protesters were killed while other reports put the number of the dead up to 1,500. 

From January to mid-March, difficult economic conditions fuelled by US sanctions and the adverse economic impact of the pandemic brought many poor people to the streets but so far the demonstrations in various provinces have been sporadic and short-lived, although almost the entire country was affected.

Last year, the IRGC re-structured its suppression machine to make sure that security forces can be quickly deployed to all parts of the country if needed. Last month with clashes between the IRGC and people in the Sunni populated Sistan and Baluchestan province, anti-riot units were quickly deployed from other provinces to make sure that the dissent would be suppressed as quickly as possible.  

Zolfaghari did not elaborate on operational details and the scope of powers of the Dissent Monitoring Committees, but explained, using the official sugar-coated jargon, that they have been set up to "quickly follow up on phenomena that could create problems for the people" and to "prevent events that could lead to tension."

According to the Interior Ministry's website, the official name of the committee is "Public Dissent Monitoring Committee." The body is going to operate all over Iran and will be based in the offices of local governors.

Furthermore, the Committee has apparently been in existence as the website indicates that it has been holding meetings at national and local levels. So far, the regional committees have discussed issues such as fuel pricing, the rising prices of essential commodities and other matters that may give rise to dissent.

In the aftermath of the 2019 unrest, several lawmakers accused Rahmani Fazli and the Interior Ministry for being "the elements of suppression." When they charged that security forces shot protesters in the head, he said: "Of course, we also shot some in the foot!"