US Senator Expresses Concern Over Russo-Iranian Alliance In Ukraine War

Western intelligence sources said that Caspian Air and Qeshm Fars Air both have stopped flying to Syria and the only Iranian airline sending planes is Mahan Air, which was sanctioned by the United States in 2011 for transporting weapons to Iranian proxies at the outset of the Syrian civil war.

Caspian Air is also sanctioned by the United States for its links with Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and its extraterritorial Qods (Quds) Force (IRGC-QF). In 2019, the US also sanctioned Qeshm cargo airline as part of Mahan Air and providing material support to the IRGC-QF. All three airlines are believed to have been established and owned by the Revolutionary Guard.

According to information received by Iran International, Mahan Air flights have increased by 30 percent following suspension of service by the other two companies. Aleppo is the destination of most Mahan flights. The same sources said Hamid Arabnejad the CEO of Mahan Air in a recent trip to Syria took part in the inauguration of a new flight to the Aleppo airport.

In addition to transporting weapons, the sources alleged that Mahan Air is also carrying smuggled goods to Syria without paying taxes or customs duties.

Last November, a hacking group calling itself ‘Vigilant sons of the homeland’ in Persian accused Mahan Air of closely linked with IRGC-QF and often issuing fake or falsified air tickets for people with false identities.

The group also alleged that Mahan was registering its interactions with IRGC-QF in one particular name, which appeared seven thousand times in the company’s records. “We’ve found Mahan does keep records of its suspicious business with QF under the name ‘Hamrah’, and that this business is managed by sardar (general) Golparast.”

The group added that Golparast is also listed as the owner of Qeshm Fars Air which “is a known QF cover company, frequently used to transport munitions throughout the Middle East,” the group said in November.

Israel is known to have conducted operations, including in Iran, to track and prevent IRGC-QF form transporting weapons to other countries.

Iran International reported July 21 that the Israeli Mossad had captured and interrogated an IRGC official inside Iran, about weapons transfers. The man was introducing himself as Yadollah Khedmati, deputy commander of the IRGC logistics and provided information to Mossad about weapons transfers before being freed.

IRGC’s wings for weapons transport

Mahan Air was fully under the control of IRGC-QF when Qasem Soleimani headed the extraterritorial military-intelligence unit. There were many reports about the airline’s role in weapons shipments. Soleimani was killed in a targeted US air strike in Baghdad in January 2020.

Amir Assadollahi a Mahan Air pilot revealed in June 2020 that on one occasion Soleimani in 2013 Soleimani was on a Mahan flight to Syria with 200 passengers and 7 tons of “banned cargo” that landed in Baghdad with orders of the Iraqi government. Soleimani instructed the pilot to bribe inspectors and was able to continue the flight to Syria.

Iran’s former foreign minister Javad Zarif in an audio recording leaked in 2021 had said that Soleimani preferred to use the official Iran Air flights for his purposes to reduce risk to his operations.

However, it seems that with continuing Israeli air strikes on Iranian arms depots in Syria, IRGC-QF prefers to use Mahan Air more often.

Israeli is usually silent about its attacks on Iranian targets in Syria but in recent months there have been repeated attacks on Iranian arms depots. The attack on the Damascus airport on June 10 was the 15th airstrike in Syria attributed to Israel.

The Islamic Republic’s intelligence ministry released a statement on Wednesday, claiming that what it dubbed as Israeli-linked agents, who earlier allegedly planted strong explosives at a facility in the central Iranian province of Esfahan, belong to “the Komala terrorist group.”

The ministry alleged that they were directly chosen by the group’s head Abdullah Mohtadi and were introduced to Mossad, adding that they had transferred vast amounts of equipment and explosives to Iran through Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region. 

Also on Wednesday, Intelligence Minister Esmail Khatib claimed the ministry carried out “a number of successful operations” against Israel in recent months without disclosing any details. 

About a week before Iran announced the major bust of the “Israeli-backed network”, the intelligence ministry had released a statement on July 13, saying it had arrested 10 armed members of a Kurdish separatist group in northwestern parts of the country. Extra details were added to the story bit by bit during the following days.

Iran has not introduced any evidence linking the detained person with Israel. Since May, several Revolutionary Guard personnel were killed or died in Iran and Tehran blamed Israel for the operations. In June, a large scale purge took place among IRGC intelligence cadres.

The Islamic Republic calls the Kurdish armed groups in the western provinces of Iran, "terrorist groups" or "anti-revolutionary." Generally, the Kurdish parties − including Komala and the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI) − favor Kurdish autonomy within a federal Iran.

Spokesman for the Iranian Civil Aviation Organization Mir-Akbar Razavi announced the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between Tehran and Moscow on Tuesday after a meeting between the head of the Iranian Civil Aviation Organization Mohammad Mohammadi-Bakhsh and a Russian deputy transport minister, whose name he did not mention. 

The airlines of the two countries are now allowed to operate unlimited cargo flights without any capacity restrictions within the framework of the above agreement, he added. 

The official said the two countries will sign another agreement on providing logistics services including maintenance and support for Russian planes as well as exporting parts and equipment manufactured in Iran to Russia. 

Earlier on Tuesday, July 26, an Iranian lawmaker said military cooperation between Tehran and Moscow has upset the political equations of the global order, confirming Russia’s request to buy Iranian drones. 

US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan warned twice in July that Moscow appears to be looking at buying Iranian drones and Russian officers even visited a drone base in Iran’s Kashan to review their options.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen Mike Milley also confirmed that Russia is planning to obtain Iranian drones to strengthen its weakening position in battles.

An adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky told Iran International on July 25 that Russia and Iran are allies in the Ukraine war and it won’t be a surprise if Tehran supplies drones to Moscow.

According to a BBC correspondent, the attack on the base – located in al-Shadadi city 55 kilometers south of Al-Hasakah in the northeastern corner of Syria -- had no casualties and all the US-led coalition’s personnel are accounted for with no damage reported.

"The attempted strikes were ineffective and landed well outside the Coalition base. Our Syrian Democratic Partners quickly responded to the incident and have the lead for any further response," a senior coalition official said. 

However, Syrian news agency SANA quoted local sources as saying that several rocket targeted “the illegal US occupation base,” one of which fell inside the base, claiming that loud explosions were heard by the people of the city and the surrounding areas and smoke plumes were billowing from the base.

The same base was attacked in January, with eight rockets landing inside its perimeter.

The attack occurred less than a week after the top US Air Force general in the Middle East, Lt. Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, warned of increasing attacks by Iran-backed militias against the United States and its allies as tensions rise in the region. 

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Ebrahim Raisi last week called for US troops to leave Syria, during the visit of Russia’s Vladimir Putin to Tehran.

No group has claimed responsibility for the Tuesday night attack but the US coalition operating in Syria and Iraq has repeatedly condemned Iran for attacks on its bases as repeated strikes have hit sites near American forces in the region.

In an article with a long historical background on violent terror acts by the Mojahedin Khalq organization, known as Mek in the 1980s, the IRGC mouthpiece insisted that Iran has the Islamic Republic has the right to self-defense and it would be justified if “it employs hard power against terrorists. The capabilities of Iran’s attack drones and ballistic missiles can be used to hit the center of the [Mek] in Albania without any legal impediment.

The article added that authorities in Tehran should issue the necessary warning to the Albanian government, which is hosting a few thousands MeK members, and follow it up with military action.

But Fars also mentioned “host governments”, where the MeK might have a presence, which could include France and others in Europe.

“If host governments refuse to expel and extradite the hypocrites (a term used by Tehran for the MeK), they should be threatened with reciprocal action…based on the doctrine of the Islamic Republic to fight security threats at their source,” the article said. It went on to cite the principle of “Responsibility to Protect” the nation and the UN Charter’s article 51, “which allows military action to preserve international peace and security.”

The Mojahedin were a revolutionary group engaged in opposition to the monarchy in the 1970s and carried out armed attacks. They fully backed Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s decision to set up the Islamic Republic in early 1979 after Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi left the country and Khomeini returned from exile. However, tensions rose between the group and the clerical regime taking shape, which led to mutual violence.

The MeK leadership fled to Iraq, which had attacked Iran in September 1980, and received protection from the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein who helped them form a militia and fight against Iran. The Islamic Republic counts this as high treason, in addition to violent acts the group carried out inside Iran.

In 1988, the Islamic Republic carried out a decision blessed by Khomeini to kill around 3,000 members of the group serving their prison sentences. Many say this is equivalent to war crimes and a crime against humanity.

An Iranian diplomat who plotted to bomb a MeK rally in Paris was convicted and sentenced to 20 years in jail on terrorism charges by a Belgian court, and a former prison Guard was recently sentenced to life in Sweden for his role in the 1988 prison killings.

MeK members and sympathizers gradually migrated to Europe and North America where they formed a close-knit organization, sometimes likened to a sect, which increasingly changed its path as a terror group to a relatively rich lobbying organization in the West against the clerical regime. However, a few thousand members who had stayed behind in a camp in Iraq were transferred to European counties and Albania by the United States and the United Nations in 2016.

The same year the group opened an office in Albania and is generally referred to as an Albania-based organization. Until a few years before the move, MeK was listed as a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union, but as it became a lobbying and political entity, the designations were lifted.