Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in a televised address has praised paramilitary volunteers tasked with quashing dissent. Meanwhile, a pro-reform Iranian news site said Saturday that 140 ophthalmologists have expressed concern over a rising number of people blinded after being shot by security forces with metal pellets. Khamenei met with the paramilitary Basij group and reiterated unsupported claims that the mass anti-government protests are a foreign plot devised by the U.S. to destabilize Iran. He said the protesters were mercenaries. Khamenei's comments came a day after Iran's President Ebrahim Raisi met with the Basij and praised their efforts to maintain security.