<p>In 2007, the US Treasury designated the IRGC’s Quds Force, its unit in charge of operations abroad, “for its support of terrorism,” and has described it as Iran’s “primary arm for executing its policy of supporting terrorist and insurgent groups.” By law, the power to appoint and remove the commander of the IRGC is given to the supreme leader. The supreme leader also appoints clerical representatives to the various units of the IRGC whose guidance and instructions are binding on commanders. Iranian law makes “belief and practical obedience to the principle of the clerical rule” a condition of membership in the IRGC, further establishing absolute loyalty to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei as the IRGC’s guiding principle. Efforts to normalize the IRGC’s extraordinary role in Iran over the years have resulted in a complex organization chart. Administratively, the IRGC falls under the Joint Armed Forces General Staff, part of the Ministry of Defense. But these layers of oversight do not give Iran’s nominally elected civilian authorities real control over the IRGC, as the entire military remains subordinate to the Supreme National Security Council, which in turn answers to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Iranian opposition President Maryam Rajavi, head of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), has long been calling for the international community to completely end the appeasement approach vis-à-vis the regime in Iran. On January 11 of this year, Mrs. Rajavi called for the specific IRGC blacklisting as an FTO alongside the referral of Iran’s human rights violations dossier to the United Nations Security Council.</p>
