In his persistent pursuit of deep purges of intelligence cadres and managers appointed by the just-fired intelligence minister Mohsen Ejhei, Ahmadinejad and his selected minister-care taker at Iran’s ministry of intelligence fired two more deputies, bringing the total removed senior officials in recent weeks to four.
After the firing of cultural deputy Haj Habibollah and counter-intelligence deputy Khazai, knowledgeable sources reported that Firuzabadi, the technical deputy and Mansouri, the parliamentary deputy at the ministry were also both sacked on Saturday. At the same time, there is strong speculation that the deputy for internal security too would be fired any time.
The sackings indicate the differences that have emerged and heightened within the intelligence apparatus of the country since the contested June 12 presidential election.
Baztab news website affiliated with former Passdaran Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) commander Mohsen Rezai confirmed these latest two dismissals.
Hassan Yunesi, the son of the minister of intelligence during president Khatami’s administration between 1997 to 2005, also confirmed the removal of these two senior intelligence directors on his personal website and described the negative impact of the firings as being “unprecedented at the ministry since its creation which would greatly hurt the management of the agency.”
Yunesi further wrote, “Reliable sources have said that the new intelligence team under the leadership of H.T. and A.S. (both career officers at the ministry) is the leading the purges with the aim of accomplishing long-held desire of some individuals and political groups in society. Following hardline groups outside the ministry has been one of the dreams of the ministry of intelligence and its cadre since the days when minister Yunesi led the agency but which he successfully prevented from materializing thus keeping the ministry independent.”
H.T. is a reference to Hassan Taeb, the current had of the Basij para-military forces while A.S. is a reference to Ahmad Salek, a representative of the leadership in the intelligence unit of the IRGC and the head of selection committee in Ahmadinejad’s administration.
Following the June 12 presidential election, a group of officials at the ministry of intelligence had resigned from their posts and in a letter to the intelligence security of the ministry of intelligence warned that in view of Ahmadinejad’s personal supervision of the ministry there was a serious concern that intelligence files and counter-intelligence records of some individuals close to the president, particularly Esfandiar Mashai, Ali Saeedloo, Hamid Mowlana, Mohammad-Reza Rahimi, and Mohammadzadeh ‘would be removed and destroyed from the archives of the ministry’.
There have also been other reports that the resignations of Habibollah and Khazai were done in protest to the reported interference of the intelligence branch of the IRGC in the affairs of the ministry of intelligence and the illegal hiring at the ministry of some members of the ‘Sazemane Etelaat Ostan Tehran” (Tehran Province Intelligence Organization), commonly known as ‘Etelaat Tehran’ (Tehran Intelligence) in recent weeks.