GOP senators warn Biden against taking Iran's IRGC off terror list
The Republican letter comes as nuclear talks remain at a standstill over Iran's insistence that the United States delist the IRGC as a terrorist organization.
A group of Republican senators warned President Joe Biden on Monday against lifting the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ terrorist designation, which Iran has made a condition of its return to the landmark nuclear accord.
Whether the IRGC remains on Washington’s formal list of terror organizations remains the principal sticking point in the now-paused talks in Vienna. The Trump administration imposed the designation a year after it withdrew from the nuclear pact, marking the first time the United States had ever branded part of another country’s military as a foreign terrorist organization (FTO).
On Monday, 14 Senate Republicans wrote that dropping the label would be “wildly misguided” given that the IRGC has "shown no meaningful change in conduct."
Last week, armed groups linked to the IRGC were blamed for attacks in Syria and Iraq that targeted facilities hosting the US-led international coalition. The IRGC took credit in March for a ballistic missile attack near the US Consulate in the Iraqi Kurdish capital of Erbil.
