Critics slam UK government for refusing to proscribe IRGC

Cross-party voices say a ban is vital to UK security as well as being a strong tool against Iran.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

Critics from across the political spectrum condemned the British government on Tuesday for refusing to proscribe Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization, arguing that the move is essential to protecting the UK and supporting the Iranian people.

Several lawmakers from the governing Labour Party expressed shock at the decision.

Labour MP Mark Seward, chair of Labour Friends of Israel, described the IRGC — a state-run military force parallel to Iran’s regular army — as “a direct threat to stability in the Middle East and UK national security,” urging that legislation be “brought forward without delay.”

MP David Taylor said that beyond the IRGC’s “dark and despicable crime” of “gunning down peaceful protesters,” proscription was necessary because of the danger it poses inside Britain.

“We also know the threat the IRGC poses on our streets, from assassination plots to threatening journalists,” Taylor said, adding that banning the group would fulfill a Labour manifesto commitment made in 2023, when the party was still in opposition.

Conservative lawmakers echoed the criticism.

MP Sir Iain Duncan Smith told online news channel Talk TV that the IRGC was “a real threat” to the British public, particularly Iranian dissidents who are “pursued,” “spied on,” and “regularly threatened” by IRGC operatives in the UK – “and we’ve done nothing about it.”

“It’s bonkers to me that the IRGC, who stir up Islamic extremism and support many anti-British organizations that want to carry out vile acts in the UK” are not yet outlawed, he said. “It’s about the strongest thing that we can do – it’s the one thing actually that will hurt them.

“If other countries do the same” he added, “then it suddenly becomes really difficult for Iran to operate – and for that matter, to get arms.”

Smith rejected the Foreign Office’s argument that banning the IRGC would undermine Britain’s diplomatic influence as a potential mediator between Washington and Tehran.

“If Iran needed a go-between – which they don’t – they’d go to Qatar, they wouldn’t come to us,” he said. “When did we ever have influence with Iran?”

Proscribing the IRGC would make a “huge difference,” he said, because it would allow British authorities to prosecute members, seize assets “almost immediately,” and pursue operatives wherever they are found, Smith argued.

Defending the government’s position, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said labeling the IRGC a terrorist organization would be “futile” and have “no impact” beyond making Britain feel “better about ourselves.”

Answering criticism in Parliament, Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper acknowledged the Iranian regime’s “horrendous actions” and “brutality,” noted that the previous, Conservative government had not banned the IRGC, and said London would instead ask the international community to put “overwhelming pressure” on Iran through sanctions, action at the UN, “and every avenue we can.”

In a Times Radio interview Monday, Business Secretary Peter Kyle had said that an “independent reviewer” had said that proscribing a foreign state organization  “like we do for domestic terror organizations” is “not appropriate,” and that “We’ve already used sanctions against Iran to the full extent we can.”