Iran’s president has promised to take revenge after a colonel in the powerful Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) was shot dead in Tehran on Sunday. Two gunmen on a motorbike opened fire at Sayad Khodai as he sat in a car outside his home, state media reported.
Col Khodai was a member of the elite Quds Force, the IRGC’s shadowy overseas operations arm, they said.President Ebrahim Raisi blamed “the hands of global arrogance” – a reference to the US and its allies.
IRGC spokesman Ramazan Sharif said the killing of Col Khodai would strengthen its determination to “defend security, independence and national interests and to confront the enemies of the Iranian nation”
No group or country has claimed it was behind the killing, which was the most high-profile in Iran since the top nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh was shot dead in an attack on his convoy outside Tehran in November 2020. Iran blamed that assassination on Israel. Israel neither confirmed nor denied involvement, although the former head of its Mossad intelligence agency said last year that Fakhrizadeh had been a target “for many years”.
Credit: bbc.com
