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Last week the leading Iranian opposition group
held a press conference in Westminster to highlight some aspects of the
ever-growing commercial empire being maintained by Iran's Islamic RevolutionaryGuard Corps as well as the ways in which the paramilitary's wealth contributes
to the ongoing operations of terrorist groups throughout the region.
The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)specifically identified the sites of some 90 docks operated exclusively by the
IRGC within Iranian ports. The information was obtained from the network of thePeople's Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK), which has assets within the
clerical regime and the IRGC itself and made international headlines in 2002
when it revealed key details about the regime's nuclear program.
The NCRI pointed out that Iranian Supreme Leader
Ali Khamenei specifically ordered docks whose operations have been granted to
the IRGC should be subject to no oversight. The notably hard line paramilitary
organization has free rein to smuggle black market goods into the Islamic
Republic and most disturbingly, to smuggle weapons, financial resources and
personnel to spread the regime's influence into the wider regions of the Middle
East, including Syria, Yemen, and Bahrain.
For those who have been following the activities
of the Islamic Republic of Iran throughout its 38 years of existence, one
should understand that both of these IRGC operations have a long history. The
financial enrichment of the organization and the development of its status as
the foremost supporter of terrorism in the Middle East and the world at large
has now become very apparent.
Naturally, these two trends feed into one another
with increasing levels of wealth securing greater levels of domestic and international
power for one of Iran's most hard line institutions.
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