The Australian government has been accused of hiding the true threat posed by Iran's IRGC as it denies documents as to the truth behind the u-turn to proscribe the world's most dangerous state-backed terror group.
Sydney-based Iranian Arash Behgoo has been denied access to government records after lodging a Freedom of Information request with the Attorney-General’s Department in June last year, seeking explanation as to why the IRGC was not banned under a motion in January last year when lawmakers were extremely close to proscribing the group.
The country's Senate claimed at the time that “as an organ of a nation state, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is not the kind of entity that is covered by the terrorist organisation provisions in the Criminal Code.” It also claimed that the IRGC could not be listed for legislative reasons because of its status as an organ of the nation state.
Initially, in August, Behgoo’s request was denied on grounds of “national security, defence or international relations”, a common obstacle to understanding the mechanics of issues such as designation amid the extreme complexities of geopolitics.
However, Behgoo said Australians deserved to know the threat they were facing. “Many of my fellow Australians may not know about this organization and it’s my duty, for the sake of our national security, to talk about the risk that I know of,” he said.
“I consider it my duty to my home to talk about it and to inform others that without a listing under the Criminal Code, the agents of the IRGC can roam freely in Australia and pretty much do whatever they want and they wouldn’t be committing criminal offences.”
The Iranian who moved to Sydney with his family five years ago, says he is now considering appealing the decision. “It is not just a bunch of fanatics who have wild ideas – they do things and you can see it all over the world,” Behgoo told Sky News.
“You can ignore them, but they won’t ignore you. We can and we must list them on our Criminal Code and make sure that we do a great job of enforcing our law because those who neglected this risk, you can see what has become of them.”
A spokesperson for the Attorney-General's department told Sky News that it has been long-standing practice that "the department does not comment on whether an organisation is being, or has been, considered for listing as a terrorist organisation."
Lawmakers meanwhile are campaigning for change. “The government is making excuses and is not being upfront about the reasons that it hasn't listed the IRGC as a terrorist organisation,” Senator Claire Chandler told Sky News.
She has long rallied for designation, highlighting the disruptive nature of the IRGC abroad including the recent hostilities in the Middle East, sparked by the Iran-backed Hamas attack on Israel, and subsequently followed by action in support of Hamas by Iran's proxies in Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq and Syria.
“It is, frankly, disgraceful that the government won't provide them on a confidential basis to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security. This is a committee that is designed to be able to see this information and have that layer of transparency and accountability over government decision-making in the most sensitive of areas.”
The IRGC was listed back in 2018 by Saudi Arabia and Bahrain and in 2019, by the US. The Australian committee, formed in the wake of the brutal 2022 crackdowns on protesters, has seen several sanctions imposed on both individuals and entities but as yet, the government, like those in countries such as the UK and Canada, has abstained from designation.
Hopes to revive the collapsed JCPOA nuclear deal appear to remain a barrier to progress, with several Western governments hoping to revive talks. Conversely, Iran has only enhanced its Uranian enrichment and escalated its brutal crackdown on dissent, with record numbers of executions last year, exceeding 800.
“I suspect that that is one of the reasons that this government in Australia hasn't listed the IRGC because they think it will be problematic in terms of any relationship that Australia tries to manage with Iran,” Senator Chandler told Sky News.
But she warned: “We know that the IRI [Islamic Republic of Iran] regime are not good faith actors. They are not a good government that Australia should be dealing with on a regular basis. They are a regime that we should be minimizing our relationship with to the greatest extent possible.”
Of most concern, she says, is the risk of attacks on Australian soil. Attacks by the IRGC and its proxies have been planned and foiled against Jewish and Israeli targets across the world from South America to Europe, in addition to dozens more against Iranian dissidents abroad, including reporters from Iran International.
Last year, the UK’s top intelligence chief said Iran was among the UK’s biggest threats with multiple attacks foiled on British soil. In Israel, Mossad’s head said they too had worked with foreign intelligence agencies to foil dozens of attacks abroad. Iran continues to openly threaten members of the Trump administration for the assassination of Qods Force commander, Qassem Soleimani in 2020.
In Australia, the threats have been no less apparent. In spite of Iranian denials, the Australian government admits it is “concerned” by Iran’s ongoing espionage activities.
A spokeswoman for Australia’s Home Affairs Department told Iran International in January: “Last year, the Australian Government made it clear that it is concerned by reports of harassment and monitoring of people in Australia by foreign governments, including Iran.”
In January, The Australian Financial Review published an interview with the Islamic Republic’s Ambassador to Australia, Ahmad Sadeghi, during which he rejected claims by Australia's Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil that the Iranian government had been spying on dissidents in Australia, insisting they were safe from harm or kidnapping.
However, last year, O’Neil revealed that Australia had disrupted the activities of suspected Iranian intelligence who had conducted surveillance of the home of an Iranian-Australian dissident, as well as their family, part of a wider global crackdown in the wake of the 2022 uprising.
"I just want to step back and say this again: we have here someone living in our country who is being followed, watched, photographing their home invaded by people at the direction of a foreign power. This is happening in Australia, and this is something ASIO was onto like a shot," O'Neil said last year.
And now, the concerns remain. “Australians should be very concerned that our current government is not willing to list the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organisation,” Senator Chandler said.
“We know that this is the entity that is causing significant violence and significant terror in the Middle East right now and we also know that the IRI regime has undertaken foreign interference activities in this country here in Australia and there are questions to be asked about the influence of the IRGC on our own soil.”
Gholam-Ali Jafarzadeh Imanabadi, a former lawmaker from the northern city of Rasht, questioned why candidates with judicial clearance were rejected from running in the parliamentary election, while others caught in illegal activities were approved by the Guardian Council's arbitrary vetting process.
Imanabadi charged in an interview with Rouydad24 website that the biased vetting of the candidates has led to the formation of the weakest parliament in the Islamic Republic’s 45-year history, and the coming to power of the weakest President.
The Guardian Council is a constitutional body supposed to approve candidates to make sure their beliefs and conduct do not violate the basic tenets of Islamic laws. However, in recent years, the body controlled by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has become capricious, rejecting former senior regime officials and anyone whose complete loyalty is in any doubt.
Imanabadi also raised concerns about the consistency of the Guardian Council's decisions. When questioned about the rejection of former Majles Speaker Ali Larijani's qualification in the 2021 presidential election due to his daughter living abroad, contrasting with the approval of incumbent Majles Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf despite his son's overseas residency, Guardian Council Spokesperson Tahan Nazif stated: "Every election has its own criteria. However, no candidate has ever been disqualified solely on the basis of his family's situation."
However, the Guardian Council had officially cited Larijani's daughter's residence abroad as the reason for his disqualification. Imanabadi noted that as Larijani's daughter is a married woman, her situation should not affect her father's eligibility. He further queried: "How can a man who has led the legislative body for 12 years lack qualifications?"
Meanwhile, referring to Ghalibaf's case and corruption charges against him, Imanabadi said that any other candidate with one fifth of the problems Ghalibaf has, would have never gotten through the Guardian Council's vetting. He added that there were other candidates who got through although had been convicted or were involved in unethical corruption cases.
He charged that the Guardian Council wants only ultraconservative "yes men" for the parliament. Imanabadi further said that the Guardian Council's decisions on qualifications is politically motivated.
Similar questions have also been raised about the Guardian Council's verdict about the Assembly of Experts candidates' disqualifications of senior politicians including former President Hassan Rouhani.
Rouhani's former chief of staff Mahmoud Vaezi said in an interview with the Iranian Labor News Agency (ILNA) on Monday that Rouhani was informed about his disqualification through a telephone call from the Guardian Council. Rouhani who is an incumbent member of the Assembly has repeatedly called for explanations for his disqualification, but the Guardian Council has left all of his inquiries unanswered.
Vaezi refuted the Guardian Council's claim about Rouhani's representative having been briefed on the reasons of his disqualification, adding that the former President has never sent a representative to the Guardian Council. He added that the claim about Rouhani's representative was made only after Rouhani sent four letters to the Council.
The complaints made by Rouhani is not the only ones sent to the Guardian Council. On Monday, the IRGC announced on Telegram that the Guardian Council has received more than 7,000 complaints about the elections just from the three cities.
The IRGC's Telegram channel explained that the complaints made from Andimeshk were about scaring the voters and election officials on the voting day, serious assault and battery against voters including women, fighting at polling stations, thugs preventing people from voting, attacks on private vehicles, throwing stones at people's houses, distorting ballot papers, and early victory announcements. However, the IRGC's Telegram channel did not elaborate on the outcome of those complaints.