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Iran Focus
 Tehran, Iran, Sep. 08 – The
newly-appointed Iran police chief
said that as part of a new policy to aggressively crack down on
“trouble-makers”, or dissidents, in society, the SSF were being assisted by
members of the hard-line Islamist Bassij, a
government-run Persian-language website reported on Thursday.
The Bassij, para-military
vigilantes, are loyal to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
State Security Forces commander Ismail Ahmadi Moghaddam said that
the new crackdown coincided with the start of the new academic year, when
travel and activity is at its peak, the website Entekhab
wrote.
There had been a “formulation of cooperation between the State Security
Forces and the Bassij”, Ahmadi
Moghaddam said.
The SSF commander said that under the new guidelines the Bassij will act in coordination with the police to
prevent social disturbances.
Ahmadi Moghaddam was
previously the deputy chief of the paramilitary Bassij
and commander of the force in Greater Tehran before becoming commander of
the SSF.
In July, he announced that members of the Bassij
were authorised to assist the police in cracking
down on dissent.
Khamenei’s appointment of Ahmadi
Moghaddam, a veteran paramilitary commander with
a reputation for ruthlessness, was widely regarded as a move to place the
law enforcement forces under the control of the Revolutionary Guards.
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