The European Union imposed sanctions on a number of members of and entities linked to Iran’s paramilitary Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) over violations of human rights, because it considers a choice to additionally add the group on the bloc’s terrorist listing.
“The EU will continue supporting the rights of Iranians in defence of their fundamental human rights,” mentioned the bloc’s high diplomat Josep Borrell after a international ministers’ assembly in Brussels on Monday.
Tehran has cracked down on demonstrations, together with finishing up current executions of protesters, triggered by the loss of life of the younger Iranian Kurdish lady, Mahsa Amini, in police custody after her arrest for allegedly violating strict Islamic costume codes.
Taking impact on Monday, the brand new punitive measures goal Abbas Nilfrushan, a deputy commander within the IRGC, and the chief of a unit charged with quelling the protests.
Ravin Academy, a cybersecurity agency linked to the IRGC and Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence, was additionally included for its function in recruiting hackers to disrupt protesters’ communications.
The Iranian Minister of Sport and Youth, Hamid Sajjadi, was focused for his function in punishing Iranian athletes that spoke out in opposition to repression in Iran. The EU mentioned Sajjadi was personally concerned within the regime’s chastisement of Elnaz Rekabi, an Iranian athlete climber who final 12 months competed in South Korea and not using a headband as required below Iran’s Islamic costume code. According to the EU, Rekabi was coerced into apologizing and her household dwelling was reportedly demolished in December.
In complete 37 targets – 18 people and 19 entities – had been hit with an EU asset freeze and journey ban. It is the fourth spherical of EU sanctions because the protests started in September 2022. Altogether, 164 people and 31 entities linked to human rights violations in Iran have now been focused.
Ahead of the assembly, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock once more urged the EU to put the IRGC on the bloc’s terrorist listing. Continued “brutal actions” in Iran imply the EU has “to discuss the legal options” to listing the IRGC as a terrorist group, Baerbock mentioned.
Last week the European Parliament additionally referred to as for the group’s inclusion in a vote. However, the transfer is legally difficult. The bloc first wants a ruling from a courtroom in an EU member state that designates the IRGC as a terrorist group, Borrell mentioned.
There “has to be first a condemnation [by] a court in one member state,” Borrell mentioned. Jean Asselborn, Luxembourg’s international minister, mentioned that is essential to be “absolutely watertight” legally. Placing the IRGC on the bloc’s terrorism listing might be challenged within the EU’s courtroom programs.
The IRGC is Iran’s elite armed forces. Established after the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the unit is meant to stop coups and shield state ideology. It has come below rising criticism for its involvement in harshly suppressing current unrest in Iran on behalf of the federal government.
“Repression continues in Iran. The rights of Iranian men and women to demonstrate peacefully are not recognized, abuses continue,” mentioned French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna. The Tehran regime is “on a collision course with its own people” and is making an attempt to “crush this civil society movement with all brutality,” added Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg.
