Iran Revolutionary Guard defends involvement in oil industry
In a recent interview, a senior commander explaimed that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard became involved in the oil industry to help the country manage under international sanctions.
A senior commander in Iran’s Revolutionary Guard has defended the body's entrance into the oil industry, saying that without it, the country would not have been able to manage under international sanctions.
Col. Rasool Sanaeirad, head of the political office of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC or Sepah), told Basirat, “We are in a situation of economic war and Sepah … has additional capacity for the realization of a resistance economy and to help the executive [branch] and the system.”
“Just as before this,” he continued, “Sepah had an added role in decreasing the effects of sanctions with a presence in the construction field. If Sepah had not entered fields such as the oil industry, foreign companies could have inflicted irrecoverable blows to our oil industry and our economic activities.”
Sanaeirad did not explain the specifics of how Sepah’s activities in the oil sector helped reduce the pressure of international sanctions.
