EU foreign ministers agreed on Thursday to designate Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a “terrorist” organisation, the bloc’s foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said, marking a significant and symbolic escalation in the EU’s stance toward Tehran amid its deadly crackdown on protests.
“Any regime that kills thousands of its own people is working toward its own demise,” she said, News.Az reports, citing foreign media.
Meeting in Brussels ahead of the terror designation decision, the ministers also voted to add 15 individuals and six “entities” to an asset freeze and visa ban blacklist.
What does the EU’s terror listing mean for the IRCG?
The designation, which is largely symbolic, is in response to the brutal clampdown on anti-government protests in Iran in January, in which thousands of people have been killed.
“If you act as a terrorist, you should also be treated as terrorists,” Kallas told reporters ahead of the meeting.
Kallas, a former Estonian prime minister who now serves as the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, said the measure would put the IRGC “on the same footing” as terror groups such as al-Qaeda, Hamas and the so-called Islamic State.
