Protests continued overnight on November 12-13 in many Iranian cities as rights defenders warned of a climbing death toll and Tehran responded angrily to outside criticism of the Iranian government's eight-week crackdown.

There were street demonstrations overnight in the capital, Tehran, and the cities of Arak, Shiraz, Zanjan, Sanandaj, and Sardasht.

Iran has been engulfed by protests and a brutal crackdown triggered by the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in mid-September after her detention by morality police for an alleged dress-code violation.

Video also emerged on social media of the moment when a 17-year-old was apparently shot by security forces in the city of Karaj. The images showed Mehdi Hazrati pushing ahead of a crowd of protesters before being gunned down.

Elsewhere, the Hamamihan newspaper quoted a student activist as saying around 150 students at Al-Zahra University had been suspended overnight following a punishment directed at a gathering there.

Al-Zahra University has been one of the hubs of student protest since the current wave of unrest began.

The Iran Human Rights group, a nonprofit that operates inside and outside the country, said on November 12 that it had counted at least 326 deaths so far across 22 provinces since the start of the unrest, including 43 children.

It said that November 4, when at least 16 people died after security troops appeared to fire on a crowd in the town of Khash, was one of the bloodiest days in the crackdown on two months of protests.

The group repeated its call for a more decisive and urgent response from the international community to prevent Iranian deaths.

Western sources suspect at least around 14,000 others have been caught up in mass arrests since the protests began. (SJ/RFERL)