TEHRAN (National Times)- Iran will avenge the killing of a Revolutionary Guards colonel who was shot dead in Tehran, President Ebrahim Raisi warned on Monday.<\/p>\n
Assailants on motorcycles on Sunday hit Colonel Sayyad Khodai with five bullets as he sat in his car outside his home. Iran blamed \u201celements linked to the global arrogance\u201d the Islamic republic\u2019s term for its arch-enemy the United States and US allies including Israel. It was the most high-profile killing inside Iran since the November 2020 murder of top nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.<\/p>\n
Raisi said: \u201cI insist on the serious pursuit (of the killers) by security officials, and I have no doubt that the blood of this great martyr will be avenged. \u201cThere is no doubt that the hand of global arrogance can be seen in this crime,\u201d he added, echoing the Guards\u2019 assertion, before he travelled to Oman where he was to meet Sultan Haitham bin Tariq. A memorial service for Khodai was scheduled in Tehran at 5:00 pm local time (1230 GMT) on Monday.<\/p>\n
The funeral will take place at 8:00 am (0330 GMT) on Tuesday in Imam Hossein Square in central Tehran, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp said in a statement. The ideological arm of Iran\u2019s military, the Guards described Khodai as a \u201cdefender of the sanctuary\u201d. State television noted that Khodai was \u201cknown\u201d in Syria, where Iran has acknowledged deploying \u201cmilitary advisers\u201d. \u2013 \u2018Criminal act\u2019 \u2013 The official news agency IRNA said Khodai was killed by five bullets as he returned home Sunday at around 4:00 pm.<\/p>\n
The agency published pictures showing a man slumped over in the driver\u2019s seat of a white car, with blood around the collar of his blue shirt and on his right arm. He was strapped in with his seat belt, and the front window on the passenger side had been shot out. The Fars news agency reported that the state prosecutor had visited the scene of the killing and ordered the \u201cquick identification and arrest of the authors of this criminal act\u201d.<\/p>\n
The Guards said they had arrested several \u201cthugs linked to the intelligence agency of the Zionist regime,\u201d as Iran calls its enemy Israel. A statement said the suspects had been involved in a series of crimes, including \u201crobberies, kidnappings, and vandalism\u201d. \u201cThe dimensions of this assassination are being investigated,\u201d said the spokesman for the joint chiefs of staff of the Iranian armed forces, General Abolfazl Shakarji.<\/p>\n
Khodai\u2019s killing came as negotiations between Iran and world powers to restore a frayed 2015 nuclear deal have stalled since March. One of the main sticking points is Tehran\u2019s demand to remove the Guards from a US terrorism list a request rejected by Washington. The 2015 agreement gave Iran sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its nuclear programme to prevent Tehran from developing an atomic bomb something it has always denied wanting to do.<\/p>\n
But the nuclear agreement was left hanging by a thread after then US president Donald Trump pulled out of it unilaterally in 2018 and reimposed biting economic sanctions on Tehran, prompting Iran to begin rolling back on its own commitments. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
TEHRAN (National Times)- Iran will avenge the killing of a Revolutionary Guards colonel who was shot dead in Tehran, President Ebrahim Raisi warned on Monday. Assailants on motorcycles on Sunday hit Colonel Sayyad Khodai with five bullets as he sat in his car outside his home. Iran blamed \u201celements linked to the global arrogance\u201d the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":33411,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-showbiz","entry"],"yoast_head":"\n