Iran opposition group says Tehran responsible for fall of Aleppo

By: Arwa LIbrahim

Thursday 22 December

Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps built network of bases and amassed 25,000 troops in and around Aleppo, report says

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has played a significant role in retaking Aleppo from rebel fighters, a report by an Iranian opposition group says.

“The forces that occupied Aleppo were actually the IRGC and foreign mercenaries under their command,” said Shahin Gobadi, a member of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), in a video conference widely circulated on Wednesday.

Gobadi identified the Lebanese Hezbollah, Iraqi militias, the Afghan Fatimiyoon militias and the Pakistani Zeynabiyoon militias as the main forces under IRGC command in Aleppo.

The NCRI is part of the People’s Mujahiden of Iran or MEK, the largest opposition group to the Iranian government. The video seems to have been a follow-up to a report collated by the MEK and released to The Washington Times on Tuesday.

The MEK has established a track record of accurately reporting misdeeds by Tehran over the past decade, including its attempts to hide nuclear weapons-related facilities from UN inspectors.

How opposition collated report

For this report, the MEK relied on its network of spies inside the government and IRGC to paint a picture of Iran’s deep military involvement in the Syrian conflict.

“The fact is that Aleppo has been occupied by the IRGC and its mercenaries,” MEK told The Washington Times on Tuesday. “Mass executions, preventing the transfer of civilians, including women and children, [and] attacking civilians has all been done by the forces of the mullah’s regime.”

According to the report: “The obstruction to the transfer of residents out of Aleppo and the two incidents of the killing of residents over two consecutive days were perpetuated by the IRGC and their mercenaries,” said Gobadi.

A convoy of about 800 people was taken hostage and four people were killed at a Hezbollah checkpoint near Ramoussah on Friday. The situation was repeated in a similar incident on Tuesday when a convoy leaving Aleppo was stalled for nearly 24 hours amid delays in the evacuation of the two Shia villages of Foua and Kefraya in Idlib province.