Reports emerge about the arrest of a "Guardian of the IRGC" on charges of "leaking" an audio file of corruption of IRGC commanders

Published reports indicate that Mohammad Ghaemi, the former director of the liquidation board of Yas Holding, affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards, has been arrested and has been in prison for more than two months without access to a lawyer.

The website "Roydad 24" confirmed the news of Mr. Ghaemi's arrest, expressing ignorance of the reasons for his arrest, but some media outlets have reported that he was arrested mainly due to the leak of an audio file of corruption of IRGC commanders, which was first published by Radio Farda.

The Iran Watch website referred to Mohammad Ghaemi as the "Guardian of the IRGC" and wrote that he is in temporary detention due to a "possible complaint by Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf" and is still not allowed access to a lawyer.

The reports do not name the arresting agency, but it appears that Mr. Ghaemi was arrested by the Revolutionary Guards Intelligence Service, which is headed by Hossein Taeb, one of Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf's main supporters in the Islamic Republic.

The audio file related to a confidential meeting between Mohammad Ali (Aziz) Jafari, then-commander of the Revolutionary Guards, and Sadegh (Mirza Hassan) Zolghadrnia, former deputy for economy and construction of the Revolutionary Guards, in 2018 regarding corruption in forces related to the IRGC's Quds Force, the IRGC Cooperative Foundation, and the Tehran Municipality, was released by Radio Farda on February 11 of last year.

In this audio file, the authenticity of which was confirmed by a spokesman for the Revolutionary Guards, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, the then mayor of Tehran, was accused by then-Secretary General Sadegh Zolghadrnia of attempting to forge a document in order to cover up eight trillion tomans of money misappropriated from the Revolutionary Guards Cooperative Foundation.

Mr. Zolghadrnia clearly stated that Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, the then mayor of Tehran, was extremely upset with the handling of the corruption case related to the municipality and the Revolutionary Guard Cooperative Foundation, and after Jamaluddin Abroomand's team embezzled "8 trillion tomans" [equivalent to two billion dollars in 2018] from the Revolutionary Guard Cooperative Foundation, Ghalibaf asked him to sign a memorandum of understanding for 8 trillion tomans to resolve and reverse the matter.

"Yas Economic Development Group Company", known as "Yas Holding", was the main arm of the IRGC Cooperative Foundation, which was active in the fields of services, brokerage, and housing, and in fact played the role of the treasury of the IRGC's Quds Force.

The IRGC-affiliated Fars News Agency reported on February 15 that because “the government of the time [Rouhani’s government] was unwilling to support the fighters in the field,” Yas Holding was established by IRGC officials and “was supposed to provide the necessary financial resources to support the resistance front through the implementation of development projects.”

Senior managers of Yas Company worked under the supervision of Qassem Soleimani, the then commander of the IRGC's Quds Force, and according to Mohammad Ali Jafari's narration in the audio file, Qassem Soleimani was unhappy with the treatment of members related to the corruption case at the IRGC Holding: "He was unhappy with the treatment you [the IRGC's deputy economic officer] and the IRGC's intelligence protection officer had given Yas. He said, 'I went to Mr. [Khamenei] too.'"

Yas Holding was dissolved after widespread corruption scandals led to the arrest of some of its managers in 2017. The amount of one of the corruption cases related to this holding company was announced at 13 trillion tomans.

Mohammad Ghaemi, himself a member of the Revolutionary Guards, was tasked with liquidating the holding company's assets after it was dissolved. He is mentioned as a financier and advisor to Saeed Mohammad, a candidate for the 2012 presidential election. Mr. Mohammad was disqualified in that election.

After publishing this audio file, Mr. Ghaemi announced during a Twitter conversation with Mohammad Saeed Ahadian, advisor to Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, that the Yas Holding violations case has "185 volumes" and only the indictment "for the first 5 volumes has been issued and the second stage indictment is on the way."

He added that “in the first stage of the indictment, only one defendant out of 14 was sentenced to return 480 billion tomans in stolen property and 20 years in prison.” He was referring to Issa Sharifi, deputy to Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf during his time as mayor of Tehran, whose name was mentioned as the first defendant in this case.

The Yas Holding case was tried in a military court, and the Islamic Republic's judiciary claimed that some of the defendants were sentenced to prison and forfeited their assets. However, no information about this major corruption case has been made available to the public.

Source: Radio Farda