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Former Guards Corps commander calls for streamlining intelligence apparatus

Former Guards Corps commander calls for streamlining intelligence apparatusconcerns expressed at new wave of unrest in Azerbaijan, Khuzistan, Kurdistan, Kerman and Sistan and Baluchistan provinces

NCRI – Maj. Gen. Mohsen Rezaii, former commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and Secretary for the Expediency Council, expressed great concern over increasing popular discontent and uprisings especially after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad became president. He said, "At this critical juncture and in light of the new wave of threats against the country, strengthening and streamlining the intelligence and security apparatus is one of the most important national priorities and any delay could result in disastrous consequences for the state”.

Voicing concern at "unrests in Azerbaijan, Khuzistan, Kurdistan, Kerman and Sistan and Baluochistan provinces this year," in an interview with the state-run Baztab website yesterday, Rezaii expressed alarm over the expansion and spread of such protests.

Recalling the events of the 1980s and the massacre of 30,000 Mojahedin and other political prisoners in 1988, he called for using the services of "those forces which immediately after the revolution and at beginning of the war established a strong and capable security apparatus to handle such major problems as the Monafeqin [the Mojahedin].”

Rezaii blamed the failure of the regime’s intelligence apparatus and its suppressive efforts to confront and thwart popular uprisings on "the successive weakening of intelligence and security services of the past 20 years” and called for "the establishment of a unified and streamlined intelligence and security apparatus that could deal with future threats in the county and suppress any unrest as quickly as possible”.

Reazii’s clear admission to the failure of the clerical regime’s past suppressive measures against the Iranian people came despite the fact that the most senior regime officials, including the intelligence ministers had in previous years described this organ of suppression, espionage and murder as the "strongest" and "most efficient" intelligence service in the world.

Reazii’s comments have no message other than one of desperation in the face of growing popular discontent. They are also designed to set the stage for stepping up suppression, widespread arrests and barbaric executions to confront society’s explosive state.   

Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran
May 18, 2006