The sister of the supreme leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Badri Hosseini Khamenei, condemned the repression by the authorities against protesters that have been ongoing in the country since mid-September, TASS reports.

In a letter, excerpted from which her son Mahmoud Moradkhani tweeted, she expressed her support for the anti-government protesters.

According to her, members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC, the elite units of the Iranian Armed Forces) should lay down their arms as soon as possible and go over to the side of the demonstrators before it is too late.

She expressed her desire that the Iranian people "defeat and overthrow the despotic regime."

Iranian authorities on November 28 arrested Farida Muradkhani, the niece of the Islamic republic's supreme leader, after she urged foreign governments to sever ties with Tehran.

Farideh and Mahmoud Muradkhani are the children of cleric and oppositionist Ali Tehrani, who was married to Badri Hosseini Khamenei. CNN claims that Tehrani died in October.

Earlier it was reported that Iran allowed the blocking of bank accounts of women not wearing the hijab.