This story contains graphic details. Discretion is advised.
Hali Norei remembered her niece, Robina Aminian, who she said was shot and killed by security forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran while protesting in Tehran on Jan. 8, saying, "She was full of art, full of color."
Twenty-three-year-old Robina Aminian hoped to become a fashion designer, offering her aunt what would be her last design, a blue jean jacket with splashes of color on the sleeves, her aunt told ABC News."She asked me if I wanted it and I said no and it would look good on her," added Norei, who is based in Norway. "But, I wish I had taken it.”
Her death has left a deep unfathomable pain in her family, her aunt said, as the country reckons with the aftermath of weeks of anti-regime protests during which government forces killed thousands, according to activists.
What began in Tehran late December in response to the collapse in currency and economic conditions quickly took on a political character -- with crowds on the streets openly calling for regime change. Iranian authorities responded by launching a brutal crackdown on protests, according to observers.
As human rights groups continue reviewing the casualty reports, the death toll continues to rise. More names and pictures pour out, even as the Iranian regime continues to keep the country in a communications blackout, attempting to control what information comes in and out of the country.
The U.S.-based Human Rights Activist News Agency said they have verified over 6,400 deaths, but 11,000 more cases are under review, waiting to be verified by their names and pictures of their bodies. ABC News cannot independently verify those figures.
Roya Boroumand, executive director of the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran, told ABC News the regime is doing this on purpose to hide the massacres, adding, "They plunged the country in the dark. Because they know that what they're doing is wrong, and so they try to prevent information from being disseminated."
Robina’s aunt told us said it is hard to find out who has been killed and then, if so, to locate their body, describing the lengths Robina’s family went to just to find her lifeless.
“As my family described the scene to me, they said that it was the apocalypse in Tehran," she said. "They said that hundreds of bodies were there. She said she had to look into all those faces until she could find Robina. She said bodies had been dumped on top of each other."
An eyewitness in Iran told ABC News he watched similar scenes at the demonstrations on Jan. 8 at the Grand Bazaar in Rasht, a northern town, that quickly turned deadly.
"What happened in Rasht’s bazaar was a real holocaust," he said, asking ABC News to withhold his name for safety reasons. "Please pass this message to people who need to know this."
He said once protesters were inside the Grand Bazaar, security forces blocked main exit points, trapping protesters in and shooting anyone who tried to leave. "They shot everyone down. Anyone who was there was shot. Some people managed to drag those injured outside," he said.
He told ABC News that since the night of Jan. 8, people have gone missing and there are no signs of them in morgues or jails. He said he believed the regime could be hiding bodies in mass graves.
"My friend and I are afraid that the regime forces have lost control after this mass killing and are trying to downplay the number of death toll, maybe they have buried our children in mass graves somewhere outside the city," he said.
This comes as reports are circling on social media that women’s bodies are going missing and cannot be found.
President Donald Trump has threatened action against Iran and has moved additional American military forces into the region. His administration also imposed new sanctions on Iranian officials that the U.S. said were responsible for the "brutal crackdown on its own people."
Groups of protesters and activists who talked to ABC News have said they are hoping for an intervention as Iranians continue to search for the missing and grieve the dead.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Tuesday that he has directed the top diplomat of the country to "pursue fair and equitable negotiations" with the United States.
Many Iranians have been taking to social media to voice dissatisfaction of possible talks between Iran and the U.S.
"The blood of our young people is still fresh on streets and the world is going to engage in talks with their murderers," an Iranian protester told ABC News.
