Tehran, Jan 19, (dpa/GNA) – Iran strongly condemned a possible terrorist listing of its Revolutionary Guards by the European Union.
The Foreign Ministry on Thursday, called a proposal on the issue by the European Parliament “ill-considered and wrong.”
The plan is “a shot in the foot,” Iran’s Foreign Minister Hussein Amirabdollahian said in a statement.
The Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) are Iran’s elite armed forces. Established after the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the unit is supposed to prevent a coup and protect the state ideology.
In recent decades, the IRGC have also risen to become an economic power. The unit has come under increasing criticism for its involvement in suppressing the recent wave of protests.
Many Iranians and politicians in Europe are now calling for the Revolutionary Guards to be classified as a terrorist organization. The US did that under former US president, Donald Trump in 2019.
In view of the numerous human rights violations since the demonstrations broke out in mid-September, the EU has already imposed sanctions on many high-ranking officers of the Revolutionary Guards.
On Thursday at a question and answer period, following a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz dodged a question by an Iranian woman, who asked why Germany had not listed the IRGC as a terrorist organisation.
Scholz said his government has condemned Iran’s attacks on its own people, including several executions of citizens involved in the protest, but he did not explain why Germany has not ranked the guard as a terrorist group.
GNA