Reuters confirmed in a special report on December 23, 2019, about the deadly crackdown on November nationwide protests in Iran the death toll of 1500 that was announced by the  (PMOI /MEK Iran).

The Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) has created a new headquarters ostensibly aimed at fighting extortion and controlling price rises. This is a bit of a joke as it is the IRGC that controls much of the Iranian economy anyway.

Just as a single example of the extent of the IRGC’s stranglehold over the Iranian corporate economy considers the Khatam Al-Anbiya Construction Headquarters. This construction empire employs 135,000 employees and 5,000 subcontractors. The company doesn’t have to submit bids to tender as it has automatic approval from the regime.

The thought of the IRGC being interested in controlling extortion when they are masters at it and controlling prices when they set the prices and watch while the prices skyrocket is laughable. This happens at the same time as the majority of Iranians are suffering from grinding poverty as well as the virus epidemic. Over 146,500 people have died of the coronavirus in Iran, according to reports by the Iranian opposition, the National Council of Resistance of Iran’s (NCRI), and the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI / MEK Iran).

The IRGC has turned a blind eye towards the real problems of Iranians as they have more interest in feathering their nest, supplying foreign proxies with weapons, acquiring ever more ballistic missiles, and oppressing the Iranian public, especially those who oppose the regime.

The Iranian Resistance, NCRI, and (PMOI / MEK Iran) have long called for the IRGC to be disbanded. There is no room in Iran for a second army, which is just an economic drag on the country. The assets of the IRGC should be retrieved and used to combat the spread of Covid-19 and help ordinary Iranians cope with everyday economic pressures.

The real reasons for establishing new IRGC headquarters

The new anti-extortion /price rise headquarters has been joined by two more headquarters. One is aimed at combating the coronavirus and the other at combating what the IRGC and the regime called “thugs.”

Combating coronavirus from an IRGC point of view has little to do with improving medical resources. The IRGC is not an organization that is an expert on virus control or epidemiology. It is simply a cover for breaking into ordinary Iranian homes to check on anyone with the disease. At the same time, these raids are in reality used to search for dissenters and anyone who is vocally opposed to the regime. Chucked in prison they are more likely to catch the virus from fellow inmates.

Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, in recent weeks has made it clear that the regime has a security issue. This means that Khamenei and the regime feel threatened by the fact that ordinary Iranians are getting angry over the regime’s total incompetence to deal with the economy and the pandemic. Increasing security is a license for the IRGC to ramp up its oppressive activity under the guise of “combating Covid,” combating “thugs” and controlling “extortion.”

Most Iranians know what the IRGC’s intentions are. The so-called thugs are those who the regime thinks are troublemakers, i.e. those who are prepared to speak their minds about the regime. It is the IRGC and especially the brutal terrorists known as the Basij force who are the real thugs. These are the people who cold-bloodedly slaughtered 1,500 protesters last November. Considering the new-found interest in “controlling prices” it seems something of a contradiction that the IRGC was intent on gunning down so many innocent people who were protesting at sudden gasoline prices last November! Reuters confirmed in a special report on December 23, 2019, about the deadly crackdown on November nationwide protests in Iran the death toll of 1500 that was announced by the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI /MEK Iran) on December 15, 2019.

It is no coincidence that the IRGC and the regime are ramping up their methods of repression as the anniversary of one of Iran’s largest uprisings since the Iranian Revolution is just around the corner. Instead of making an attempt at actually solving both the economic crisis and the Covid-19 health crisis, the regime has done neither. It knows that it is under serious pressure and is lashing out in the only way it knows – with violence.

The irony is that these measures are neither going to make the economy rebound nor the virus just disappear. They are only going to make both things worse, at the same time as making the Iranian people even more alienated.

Mrs. Maryam Rajavi the President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran’s (NCRI): We saw during the November 2019 uprising that the protests suddenly erupted in 900 locations across the country. This created a brilliant model for the great uprising that will overthrow the regime.

and People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran – MEK IRAN – YouTube