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Pandemic forces Iran to cancel mass marches for revolution anniversary

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, Iran’s state-organized marches marking the anniversary of its 1979 revolution had to be reduced to vehicle parades. Yet Iranian officials found their own ways to address tensions with the West.
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​COVID-19 concerns forced Iranian authorities to cancel the typically flamboyant annual rallies on the Feb. 10 anniversary of the Islamic Revolution that overthrew the Pahlavi Dynasty in 1979.

Instead, this year’s event was characterized by street parades involving private vehicles, motorcycles and bicycles. “Yet another epic and different presence of the nation,” the state-funded IRNA News Agency wrote.

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