Calls for a comprehensive strategy against the Iranian Regime

The British Committee for Iran Freedom (BCFIF) warmly welcomes the United Kingdom’s decision to proscribe the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organisation. This crucial, long-overdue step is essential to confronting one of the world’s most dangerous instruments of state-sponsored terrorism, domestic repression, and regional destabilisation.

For years, members of our cross-party Committee from both Houses of Parliament have consistently called for the proscription of the IRGC. Through parliamentary debates, conferences, public statements, Early Day Motions, ministerial questioning, and sustained engagement with successive governments, we have argued that the IRGC’s extensive record leaves no room for ambiguity. An organisation that directs terrorist operations abroad, executes global assassination plots, orchestrates cyber warfare, and brutally suppresses its own people must be designated exactly for what it is: a terrorist entity.

The IRGC is not a conventional military institution. It is the principal apparatus through which Iran’s ruling theocracy exports extremism, finances hostile proxy militias, and seeks to intimidate democratic societies far beyond its borders. Internally, its operatives and affiliated networks play the central role in crushing peaceful protests, carrying out arbitrary arrests, torture, and executions, and silencing all calls for democratic change.

Today’s decision must not mark the end of our efforts, but rather the beginning of a robust, comprehensive policy toward the Iranian regime. Because the IRGC effectively controls the vast majority of Iran’s economy through an extensive network of front companies and commercial conglomerates, doing business with the regime inevitably means funding the IRGC. Accordingly, all commercial dealings that benefit the regime should cease. Every IRGC front company operating within the United Kingdom must be identified, investigated, and dismantled, and individuals acting on behalf of the IRGC under diplomatic, commercial, or cultural cover must be expelled.

We express our sincere appreciation to Mrs Maryam Rajavi, the President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), and to the NCRI for their tireless efforts to secure this proscription and expose the regime's crimes. Through detailed disclosures, sustained international advocacy, and extensive documentation of the IRGC’s covert operations and financial empire, Mrs Rajavi and the NCRI have made an invaluable contribution to informing parliamentarians, governments, and the international community about the true nature of this organisation.

The British Committee for Iran Freedom (BCFIF) stands firmly with the people of Iran in their struggle for freedom, democracy, and the rule of law. The Iranian people have repeatedly demonstrated that they reject dictatorship in all its forms, aspiring instead to a democratic republic founded on universal suffrage, respect for human rights, and the separation of religion and state. Britain’s decision today is a vital step toward supporting that aspiration.

It is time for our government to stand with the people of Iran in their endeavour for freedom and democracy and to recognise the right of the Iranian people and their Resistance to confront the IRGC and bring an end to the dictatorship, paving the way for a democratic republic.

British Committee for Iran Freedom

13 July 2026