Situation Report: IRGC’s ties to the international crime world uncovered in latest assassination plot foil

The U.K.-based Iran International News Channel reports that an agent hired by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corp. (IRGC) was commissioned to assassinate three individuals abroad. Israeli officials confirmed Mossad helped thwart this elaborate plot that targeted an Israeli consulate employee in Turkey, a U.S. general in Germany and a journalist in France.

The IRGC’s Quds Force, tasked with carrying out the regime’s extraterritorial operations, reportedly planned to carry out the three attacks with the help of major transnational criminal organizations. According to the report, the agent would be rewarded over $1 million after the three assassinations were completed.

The Iranian opposition news outlet disclosed that 52-year old Mansour Rassouli was the hired agent behind the assassinations attempts. Rassouli is reportedly a member of the Quds Force’s Unit 840, which carries out foreign operations. Details of how Rassouli’s arrest unfolded remains in question.

Iran has a history of using its agents to pursue dissidents and perceived enemies overseas. Last summer, three assets were charged by federal prosecutors for their role in attempting to kidnap the Iranian-American dissident Masih Alinejad from her home in Brooklyn, New York. A few months later, Turkish intelligence helped thwart an Iranian plot to assassinate an Israeli businessman in Istanbul.

The rise in Iranian assassination/kidnapping schemes also reflects the regime’s successful forging of ties with criminal organizations, particularly those tied to drug-trafficking. In 2011, U.S. officials accused Iran of plotting to assassinate Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to the U.S. with the help of a Mexican drug cartel called Los Zetas. According to reports, the cartel was also hired to help carry out additional attacks, including on the Israeli Embassy in Washington. This plan was ultimately foiled by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), due to the drug cartel’s involvement. Despite the riskiness and uncontrollability of outsourced organizations like cartels, Iran has maintained this strategy over the years. In 2020, the Turkish news agency Anadolu reported that Iran had been using a known drug trafficker, Naji Sharifi Zindashti, to kidnap dissidents on Turkish soil. At least seven other high-profile murders and abductions have been connected to Zindashti’s organization

Iran’s brazen threats and assassination attempts have prompted U.S. and Israeli officials to be on high alert. During a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing last week, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken confirmed that “there is an ongoing threat against American officials both present and past,” when asked if the IRGC is actively trying to murder Americans. Blinken also disclosed that Iranian attacks against U.S. officials have gone up 400% from 2019 to 2020.

In early 2022, Iran’s Head of Judiciary Embrahim Raisi threatened those involved with the U.S.-led targeted killing of IRGC general Qassem Soleimani “would not be safe anywhere on the globe.” Raisi vowed to punish “those who gave the order and those who committed the crime.” Shortly after these remarks circulated, the regime sanctioned 41 Americans, including Trump and Biden administration employees.

Considering Iran’s wide range of resources in the international crime world and willingness to commit cross-border acts of terror, additional assassination and kidnapping plots are likely to surface in the near future.

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