Reading desperation in Tehran: Gold is the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ best friend

Emmanuel Razavi calls the Islamic Republic of Iran a “narco state” for the smuggling he says its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) carries out to finance terrorist actions overseas, and to counterpoint its members and mates within the elite. Based on Razavi, a author specializing within the Center East who not too long ago did an investigation for Paris Match journal, the regime, which preaches adherence to strict Islamic ideas, employs morality police, bans alcohol and has no downside pushing medication to worldwide shoppers. Razavi claims that Iran’s contraband commerce is diffuse and in addition consists of important visitors in gold.

“Some planes from an Iranian firm referred to as Mahan Air journey with weapons, gold and cash inside,” Razavi tells Fox Information. “Plenty of gold. Large portions. It goes to totally different nations, and it’s laundered and reworked into money in Turkey, in Istanbul, on the black market.”  

Mahan Air is run by the IRGC and sanctioned by the USA. That cash then, Razavi says, in line with what he describes as a community of informers he’s tapped into on the bottom, finds its method into the financial institution accounts of individuals not essentially of the regime however family and friends, typically in Western-friendly nations. Maybe it’s a life insurance coverage coverage if issues in the end go badly.

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Members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps march throughout a parade to commemorate the anniversary of the Iran-Iraq conflict. (Reuters.) (Reuters)

Razavi’s story corresponds to what Israeli protection sources have highlighted in latest months—that Venezuela sends gold to Iran as cost for the oil that Iran can’t promote elsewhere—after which that gold will get cashed in, in third nations. The money goes towards financing Hezbollah and its nefarious actions, that are additionally to an extent the regime’s life insurance coverage, conserving proxy wars scorching and away from Iran’s precise territory.  

Whereas some sources say this motion of planes and gold is regular, Razavi’s analysis, which he claims comes from individuals who can’t be named as a result of delicate nature of their jobs and the repressive nature of Iran, signifies that Iranian smugglers have been shifting extra gold for the reason that demonstrations began taking place final fall following the demise of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini. The younger lady had been arrested for not carrying her hijab correctly and died in police custody. 

“There was a sort of development of all these flights. We understood from some sources that the mullahs had been worrying about what occurred relating to the demonstrations. That is the explanation in all probability why they determined to place cash outdoors Iran, mixing cash of the regime with their very own cash. It means the regime is frightened concerning the future.”

Apparently, a big group of high IRGC commanders tried to debate these worries with Supreme Chief Ayatollah Khamenei some months again, however the particulars of that contentious assembly have solely only in the near past leaked out, presumably as a result of incendiary nature of the content material.  

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Iranian police arrive to disperse a protest to mark 40 days for the reason that demise in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, whose tragedy sparked Iran’s largest antigovernment motion in over a decade, in Tehran, Iran, Wednesday, Oct. 26, 2022. (AP)

The commanders are stated to have complained about having to crack down on protesters. That is more and more bringing disgrace upon them, as a result of in some instances their wives, kids and neighbors are participating within the demonstrations, explains former Iranian diplomat Mehrdad Khonsari. And within the now-famous assembly, the commanders overtly criticized these round them who fill their pockets with successfully stolen items. The purpose was made that some within the ranks of the IRGC are not capable of make ends meet—as Iran’s inflation is, by some estimates, at 47%—whereas others’ members of the family sport watches well worth the equal of 5 years’ wage of the common foot soldier.

“The exhibition of this type of dialogue is completely unprecedented. It affords a window which individuals in Iran had not seen, and the federal government was naturally fairly anxious to quell the publication or additional discuss this topic as a result of clearly it doesn’t bode properly for the regime,” Khonsari added.

Hamed Mohammadi says the morale downside extends to Iran’s common armed forces, of which he was as soon as a member. Mohammadi, now dwelling in exile and writing for London’s Kayhan newspaper, claims that the common officer’s wage is the equivalant of simply 4 hundred {dollars} a month, and he says the price of meals in Iran is simply as excessive as it’s in London or Western Europe. When they don’t seem to be moonlighting, driving taxis or guarding the massive towers of the wealthy in north Tehran, some within the military are promoting intelligence, in line with Mohammadi.

“Disgruntled officers reveal the key data of the regime. They sabotage,” Mohammadi says. They reveal the trail of motion of Qassem Soleimani (former head of the elite IRGC Quds Power assassinated in Iraq) or Mohsen Fakhrizadeh (alleged chief of Iran’s navy nuclear analysis program—additionally assassinated). How does Israel know what’s going on within the nuclear amenities?”

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CCTV cameras are seen in a road in Tehran, Iran, April 9, 2023. (Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia Information Company) through REUTERS)

Mohammadi believes there may be additionally competitors between the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and the common military. He stories, from what his previous contacts inform him, elevated ranges of divorce and melancholy within the ranks of the navy. Nonetheless, Mohammadi says, concern retains the disgruntled from all-out revolt. 

Khonsari provides, “The federal government is in full management as we converse. They aren’t on the snapping point. However the reality is they’re additionally incapable of fixing any of the important thing points that must do with peoples’ lives. So their continuation on the helm of energy has no long-term prospect, as a result of they’re incapable of doing something until they modify their insurance policies in a severe method.”

And if the latest choice to come back down even more durable on girls who refuse to put on the hijab—utilizing cameras and facial recognition to trace them—after months of violent protests and a whole bunch of deaths is a sign, the regime is entertaining no ideas of any sort of change.