http://www.sanctioniranregime.eu/fact-sheets/irgc-business-connections/

The IRGC increasingly controls vast financial assets and economic resources within Iran. By some estimates the IRGC may involved in upwards of 30-40% of all economic activity inside Iran. The Guard runs numerous companies and dominates many of Iran’s key industries including construction, shipping and energy among others. Many of the IRGC’s business and industrial activities – especially those connected to the oil and gas sector – are heavily dependent on the international financial system. The IRGC has become so entrenched in the Iranian economy that it has become nearly impossible to conduct business in Iran without touching some Guard entity.

The Guard controlled engineering and construction firm Khatam ol-Anbia is heavily involved in Iran’s oil and gas sector. The company with about 25,000 “workers” is the largest construction organization in Iran. The company has access to government funding, a supplement of military workers and military equipment. The company was responsible for constructing the Tehran subway and controls Phases 15 and 16 of the South Pars gas field in an estimated $2 billion project.

In August 2008 the Khatem-ol Anbiya Construction Organization was sanctioned by the EU, instituting a travel ban and asset freeze. In its designation the EU stated the organization, “uses IRGC engineering resources for construction acting as prime contractor on major projects including tunneling, assessed to support the Iranian ballistic missile and nuclear programs.”[1]

The Guard annually takes in about $1billion in revenue according to a 2007 estimate, with expectations that the figure would double as President Ahmadinejad steered more business to the Guard. According to the U.S. State Department, the Guards are “taking on an increasingly influential role in Iran’s economy, with IRGC-affiliated companies winning important government contracts.”[2]

“The IRGC is so deeply entrenched in Iran’s economy and commercial enterprises, it is increasingly likely that if you are doing business with Iran, you are somehow doing business with the IRGC.” (Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Our National Security, CFR-NY, June 14, 2007)

IRGC Owned or Controlled Entities[3]:

• Khatam al-Anbya Construction Headquarters
• Oriental Oil Kish
• Ghorb Nooh
• Sahel Consultant Engineering
• Ghorb-e Karbala
• Sepasad Engineering Co
• Omran Sahel
• Hara Company
• Gharargahe Sazandegi Ghaem

Footnotes:

[1] Council Common Position 2008/652/CFSP of 7 August 2008 amending Common Position 2007/140/CFSP concerning restrictive measures against Iran
[2] (Matthew Levitt, Wall Street Journal Europe, July 2, 2007)
[3] http://www.treas.gov/press/releases/hp644.htm

http://www.sanctioniranregime.eu/fact-sheets/irgc-support-for-terrorism/

IRGC support for Hizbollah terrorists

Iran, through the IRGC, maintains an extremely close patron-client relationship with the armed terrorist elements of Hizballah. The overarching ideology of the terrorist organization is so closely linked with the Iranian regime that members of its leadership regularly brag about their obedience to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.[1] While Iran supports terrorist organizations across the globe, Hizballah is by far the largest recipient of Iranian support. According to U.S. intelligence, Iran views Hizballah as the “model” for other terrorist groups and provides the organization with financial aid, training and weaponry.[2]

The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps is the vehicle for Iranian support for Hizballah. According to the State Department report on terrorism, Iran relies on the IRGC-Quds Force to cultivate and support terrorist organizations across the world. According to the State Department annual report on terrorism, the Quds force provides weapons, training, and financial aid to Hizballah.[3]

The report elaborated that Iran provided Hizballah with $200 million and trained over 3,000 Hizballah operatives in 2008 alone. This funding and training was provided via the Quds force.[4] The Directory General of the Islamic Union in Lebanon – a Hizballah dominated, nominally broad-based Islamist coalition – explained that this training “lies at the heart” of Hizballah’s connection to the IRGC.[5]

In addition to designating the IRGC-Quds Force as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist, the U.S. Treasury Department has sanctioned a number of individuals involved with the IRGC for their direct role in supporting terrorism. In July 2009, the Treasury sanctioned Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, advisor to Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani, for providing material support to Hizballah, Hamas and other U.S. designated terrorist organizations.[6]

According to most intelligence estimates, Hizballah’s arsenal includes upwards of 42,000 long- and short-range rockets. The IRGC has assisted in this rearmament in direct violation of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701 which ended the fighting between Israel and Hizballah in the summer of 2006. Iran smuggles weapons to Hizballah via Syria, Turkey and Armenia. In the summer of 2008, a military convoy exploded as it left a munitions warehouse in the Tehran suburb of Khavarshahar. According to reports received by Western officials, the warehouse was controlled by the IRGC and the shipment was intended for Hizballah.[7]

The IRGC has recruited and trained members of Hizballah and has facilitated drills in southern Lebanon. According to a report in the Kuwaiti daily A-Siyasa, over 200 IRGC agents operate in Iraq, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates in order to recruit and fashion cells of Hizballah operatives.[8] Senior Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani also reportedly oversaw a Hizballah drill in southern Lebanon in the middle of November of last year.[9] These two reports indicate that the IRGC leadership is well integrated into Hizballah’s training structure.

Footnotes:

[1] Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah’s deputy Sheikh Abdel Karim Obeid stated that Nasrallah views obedience to the Supreme Leader as a principle. (Fars News, Official: Nasrallah Follows Path of Iranian Leader, August 16, 2009.) Additionally, Deputy Secretary General Sheikh Naim Qassem stated in an interview with the Lebanese daily Nahar al-Shabab that Iran (specifically the Supreme Leader) provides Hizballah with “general guidelines” and “legitimacy.” (July 30, 2009)
[2] Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair, Questions for the Record, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, hearing dated February 12, 2009, answers unclassified July 30, 2009
[3] State Department 2008 Country Reports on Terrorism
[4] Deputy Assistant Secretary for Terrorist Financing Daniel Glaser, Testimony before the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittees on Middle East and South Asia and Terrorism, Nonproliferation, and Trade. April 17, 2008.
[5] The Jerusalem Post Al Wattan: 20 Hizbullah men die in Iran training. April 10, 2008.
[6] TG-195: Treasury Designates Individual, Entity Posting Threat to Stability in Iraq. July 2, 2009
[7] Con Coughlin, The Daily Telegraph (London). Iranian military convoy rocked by mystery explosion. July 25, 2008
[8] As reported by The Jerusalem Post and The Media Line News Agency. Report: Iranians train Syrians to fight Sunnis. November 16, 2008.
[9] Ha’aretz and Channel 10. Senior Iranian commander leads Hezbollah drill in south Lebanon. December 2, 2008

IRGC support for Palestinian terrorists

The IRGC is heavily involved in the training, supply and financing of Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The IRGC’s Quds Force according to the U.S. State Department’s annual terrorism report provides “aid in the form of weapons, training, and funding to Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups.”[1]

In 2002, Israel naval forces seized the vessel Karin-A off the coast of Gaza. The vessel, which intelligence reports indicate was arranged by the IRGC, contained fifty tons of weapons intended for Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups.

In October 2006, then-Hamas Interior Minister Said Siyam reportedly signed an agreement with the IRGC to transform Hamas’ military wing into an adjunct IRGC force. The cost of the training was said to be $60 million.[2] The IRGC has provided military training for Palestinian terrorist groups in Gaza as well as bringing terrorists to camps in Lebanon and Iran for training.[3]

In February 2007 Khaled Mashaal, Hamas’s supreme leader, traveled to the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, to meet senior Quds Force officials to discuss setting up a supply route to enable Iran to smuggle rocket-propelled grenades, anti-tank missiles, guns and explosives from Iran, through Africa and through the border between Gaza and Egypt.[4]

Footnotes:

[1] State Department Country Reports on Terrorism, 2008
[2] “IRGC, Inc.; The business of Iran’s hardline military elite” Omeed Jafari, The Weekly Standard, May 15, 2007
[3] Ma’ariv, June 7, 2007
[4] The Daily Telegraph, June 15, 2007

http://www.sanctioniranregime.eu/fact-sheets/irgc-activities-foreign-territory/

IRGC activity in Afghanistan

Iran’s involvement in Iraq is similar to that in Afghanistan, with the regime aiming to exploit American weaknesses in order to become a bigger regional player by spreading its ideas and influence.

Quds Force has also provided assistance to the Taliban in Afghanistan. The Quds Force provided training to the Taliban on small unit tactics, small arms, explosives and indirect fire weapons. Since at least 2006, Iran has arranged arms shipments including small arms and associated ammunition, rocket propelled grenades, mortar rounds, 107mm rockets and plastic explosives to select Taliban members.

U.S. and NATO troops have intercepted shipments of Iranian-made arms in Afghanistan, including mortars, plastic explosives and explosively formed penetrators that have been used to deadly effect against armored vehicles in Iraq. Former U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan William Wood said on January 31, 2008 that “there is no question that elements of insurgency have received weapons from Iran.” The discovery of the first caches of Iranian-made weapons in Afghanistan in Apri 2008, says a State Department official, “sent shock waves through the system.”

Iran remained unwilling to bring to justice senior al-Qa’ida members it has detained, and has refused to publicly identify those senior members in its custody. Iran has repeatedly resisted numerous calls to transfer custody of its al-Qa’ida detainees to their countries of origin or third countries for trial. Iran also continued to fail to control the activities of some al-Qa’ida members who fled to Iran following the fall of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

IRGC activity in Iraq

Although Iran’s goals in Iraq since the U.S.-led coalition in invasion of Iraq in 2003 are not totally clear, it seeks—at a minimum—to do everything possible to counter U.S. influence in the country and the region, and to ensure that Iraq can never again become a threat to Iran. Iran has sought to achieve its goals in Iraq through several strategies: supporting pro-Iranian Shiite factions and armed terrorist militias; attempting to influence Iraqi political and sectarian leaders; and building economic ties throughout Iraq that might accrue goodwill to Iran. Iranian support for terrorist activity has hindered—and continues to pose a threat to—U.S. efforts to stabilize Iraq, and has heightened the U.S. threat perception of Iran generally.

From 2005-2007, at the height of Iran’s support to Shiite militias, U.S. officials publicly discussed specific information on Quds Force – a special unit of the IRGC – and Hezbollah aid to Iraqi Shiite militias, particularly the Jaysh Al-Mahdi. Despite its pledge to support the stabilization of Iraq, Iranian authorities continued to provide lethal support, including weapons, training, funding, and guidance, to militant groups that targeted Coalition and Iraqi forces and killed innocent Iraqi civilians. The Quds Force provides Iraqi militants with Iranian-produced advanced rockets, sniper rifles, automatic weapons, and mortars that have killed Iraqi and Coalition Forces as well as civilians. Tehran was responsible for some of the lethality of anti-Coalition attacks by providing militants with the capability to assemble improvised explosive devices (IEDs) with explosives that were specially designed to defeat armored vehicles. The Quds Force, in concert with Lebanese Hizballah, provided training both inside and outside of Iraq for Iraqi militants in the construction and use of sophisticated IED technology and other advanced weaponry.

Various press reports have put the number Quds intelligence personnel in Iraq around 150. Some U.S. commanders who have served in southern Iraq said they understood that there were perhaps one or two Quds Force personnel in each Shiite province, attached to or interacting with pro-Iranian governors in those provinces. Quds Force officers often do not wear uniforms and their main role is to identify Iraqi fighters to train and to organize safe passage for weapons and Iraqi militants between Iran and Iraq, although some observers allege that Iranian agents sometimes assisted the Jaysh Al-Mahdi in its combat operations.

From December 2006 through October 2007 U.S. forces arrested a total of 20 Iranians in Iraq many of whom were alleged to be Quds Forces officers. In late 2007, the U.S. military released ten of them, but continued to hold ten caught in the northern Kurdish city of Irbil believed of high intelligence value. Eventually these remaining ten were also freed, the final five on July 9, 2009. On August 12, 2008, U.S.-led forces arrested nine Hezbollah members allegedly involved in funneling arms into Iraq.

On March 24, 2007, with U.S. backing, the U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1747 (on the Iran nuclear issue), with a provision banning arms exports by Iran—a provision clearly directed at Iran’s arms supplies to Iraq’s Shiite militias and Lebanese Hezbollah. In an effort to financially squeeze the Quds Force, on October 21, 2007, the Bush Administration designated the Quds Force (Executive Order 13224) as a provider of support to terrorist organizations. On January 9, 2008, the Treasury Department took action against suspected Iranian and pro-Iranian operatives in Iraq by designating them as a threat to stability in Iraq under a July 17, 2007 Executive Order 13438. The penalties are a freeze on their assets and a ban on transactions with them. On October 21, 2007, the Administration designated the Revolutionary Guard and several affiliates, under Executive Order 13382, as proliferation concerns.

http://www.sanctioniranregime.eu/fact-sheets/domestic-operations/

The Basij, a paramilitary volunteer militia loyal to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and operating under the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, was founded to ensure the survival of the regime against foreign and domestic threats. The Basij has leaders based in mosques in every village and city throughout Iran, giving it the widest security network in the country. During the Iran-Iraq War tens of thousands of Basij members were killed on the battlefield when they volunteered to clear minefields. Following the war, the Basij were used throughout the 1990s to quell internal dissent, crackdown on student protests and enforce the regime’s strict moral code.

The Basij is widely viewed as playing a large role in the 2005 election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad – himself a former Basij member – as President of Iran. More recently, the Basij noticeably took the lead in crowd control in June 2009 when tens of thousands of Iranians demonstrators took to the streets to protest alleged electoral fraud in Ahmadinejad’s reelection. In the ensuing weeks of rioting, Mir Hussein Moussavi, the opposition presidential candidate, decried the violence carried out by the Basij against protestors. Saying that the Basijis lack uniforms, proper identification or anything that denotes them as public employees, Moussavi said they appeared with hoses, clubs, iron bars, truncheons and sometimes firearms.

The Basji has been linked to the murder of numerous civilians, including that of Neda Agha-Soltan whose death was video taped and spread widely on the internet. Human Rights Watch said the Basij were raiding homes and university dorm rooms at night, destroying property, shooting indiscriminately into crowds, beating people, and confiscating satellite dishes. They said the raids were to stop anti-government chanting and to prevent people from watching foreign news broadcasts. Commander of the Basij forces Hojjatoleslam Hossein Taeb said during the violence that the U.S. had planned to overthrow the Iranian regime and that the Basij’s most important role is to continue to confront the “soft threats in all the cultural, economic, political and social arenas.”

http://www.sanctioniranregime.eu/fact-sheets/executive-summary/

The entire Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp, also known as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), should be sanctioned by the European Union due to its terrorist activity, its support for Iran’s nuclear and missile programs and its suppression of the Iranian people. Multiple senior commanders of the IRGC have already been sanctioned by the UN Security Council and the EU for their involvement in Iran’s missile and nuclear programs. The EU has also already sanctioned the IRGC Air Force and the Khatem-ol Anbiya Construction Organization, an IRGC-owned group of companies assessed to support the Iranian ballistic missile and nuclear programmes.

Formed in the aftermath of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the Revolutionary Guard is an elite military corps that operates independently of Iran’s regular armed forces and reports directly to the Supreme Leader. The IRGC is deeply involved in the country’s nuclear, missile and other weapons proliferation activities:

• The IRGC has operational control of the regime’s strategic arsenal of Shihab-3 missiles.
• The IRGC has responsibility for the protection of Iran’s nuclear program and likely oversees covert bomb development activity.
• The IRGC controls much of the nation’s defense industries.

The organization actively supports insurgents in Iraq, provides aid to the Taliban in Afghanistan, and funds, trains, and equips, Hamas, Hizballah and other Palestinian terrorist organizations.

• The IRGC supplied key funding to the terrorist group Hizballah to enable its killing of 58 French soldiers and 241 American service members in the 1983 bombing of French and U.S. military barracks in Lebanon. The IRGC was also responsible for providing assistance in the bombing of the 1983 U.S. Embassy in Beirut which killed 63.
• The IRCG was implicated in the 1996 bombing of Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia killing 19 U.S. servicemen.
• The IRCG was implicated in 1994 bombing attack of the Amia Jewish Center in Argentina killing 85 people.

In addition the group brutally suppresses any internal threat to the stability of Iran’s theocratic regime as demonstrated by the recent and ongoing crackdown on election protestors.

The IRGC is deeply involved in the country’s nuclear, missile and other weapons proliferation activities: The IRGC has responsibility for the protection of Iran’s nuclear program and likely oversees covert bomb development activity. An undeclared uranium enrichment facility disclosed by the U.S., UK and France in September 2009 is reportedly located on an IRGC base near the city of Qom. The IRGC has operational control of the regime’s strategic arsenal of Shihab-3 missiles, with ranges capable of striking southeastern Europe.

The IRGC reportedly began its work in the nuclear field during the height of the Iran-Iraq war. According to the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), which exposed Iran’s clandestine nuclear program in 2002, by 1987 the program had established several research and development centers at various universities throughout the country and had a budget of $800 million for nuclear research. [1]

In July 2008, the British paper The Telegraph reported that the IRGC had setup several front companies around Tehran to manufacture components for advance P-2 centrifuges, capable of enriching uranium at 2-3 times the rate of previous P1 models. According to the report, a previous attempt to develop the P-2 had been halted in 2004 after IAEA inspectors uncovered the activity.[2] Senior IRGC officials are believed to have been part of Iran’s contacts with Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan.

In February 1998, the British government identified the IRGC as having procured goods and/or technology for weapons of mass destruction programs, in “addition to doing non-proliferation related business;”[3]

In 2008 the U.S. Government designated the IRGC an entity of proliferation concern for its involvement in Iran’s missile program, According to the U.S Treasury Department:

“The IRGC has been outspoken about its willingness to proliferate ballistic missiles capable of carrying WMD. The IRGC’s ballistic missile inventory includes missiles, which could be modified to deliver WMD. The IRGC is one of the primary regime organizations tied to developing and testing the Shahab-3. The IRGC attempted, as recently as 2006, to procure sophisticated and costly equipment that could be used to support Iran’s ballistic missile and nuclear programs.” [4]

In August 2008 the EU sanctioned the IRGC Air Force saying the group “operates Iran’s inventory of short and medium range ballistic missiles.”[5]

Several of the IRGC’s leaders have also been sanctioned under UN Security Council Resolution 1747. These designations were later incorporated by the EU into its sanctions regime. Sanctioned individuals include:

1. Brigadier General Morteza Rezaie (Deputy Commander of IRGC)
2. Vice Admiral Ali Akbar Ahmadian (Chief of IRGC Joint Staff.)
3. Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Zahedi (Commander of IRGC Ground Forces)
4. Rear Admiral Morteza Safari (Commander of IRGC Navy)
5. Brigadier General Mohammad Hejazi (Commander of Bassij resistance force)
6. Brigadier General Qasem Soleimani (Commander of Quds force)
7. General Zolqadr (IRGC officer, Deputy Interior Minister for Security Affairs)[6]

Footnotes:

[1] http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,310979,00.html
[2] The Daily Telegraph, July 7, 2008
[3] http://www.iranwatch.org/suspect/records/iran-revolutionary-guard-corps-(irgc).html
[4] http://www.treas.gov/press/releases/hp644.htm
[5] Council Common Position 2008/652/CFSP of 7 August 2008 amending Common Position 2007/140/CFSP concerning restrictive measures against Iran
[6] http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/Focus/IaeaIran/unsc_res1747-2007.pdf