NCRI – On the eve of the Iranian traditional fire festival of Chaharshanbehsouri on March 19, the Iranian regime’s judiciary officials are taking extensive measures to limit the public participation in the celebration that in recent years has turned into the scene of anti-government protests.
A state-run website quoted Eskandar Momeni, the deputy commander of the regime’s State Security Forces (SSF) in Tehran on Monday as saying: “In the past few months the SSF has carried out a number of operations extending from the border regions to far deep in the cities. These have resulted in discovery of many firecrackers.”
“He warned that the State Security Forces (SSF) will firmly deal with troublemakers during the festival,” state-run Farda website added.
Moayedi, commander of SSF in Fars province told the state-run Fars news agency on Wednesday “the volume and the quality” of the firecrackers show that “a group with the intention of creating unrest under the pretext of Chaharshanbehsouri (Fire Festival)” has imported those to Iran.
Moayedi said that the regime had been working in the past three months for the security of the festive period.
Vali Haji Gholizadeh, the public prosecutor for the northern city of Khoy in an official statement warned the local shops not to offer firecrackers to the public. He described the act as illegal and punishable by law.
"The State Security Forces (SSF) will firmly deal with those breaking the law," said Gholizadeh.
In the western city of Kermanshah the SSF has declared a “special plan for dealing harshly with the firecracker suppliers.” According to this plan, “individuals involved in providing and distributing firecrackers in past few years would be put under control and a surveillance unit will act in special way to identify them,” state-run Fars news agency reported.
Every year the occasion turns into a showdown between people and the youth on the one hand and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Bassij paramilitary force, plain cloths agents and other suppressive forces across the nation on the other.
This year the celebration is coinciding with the parliamentary elections in Iran which had already been boycotted by the main Iranian opposition group, the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK).
Last year, despite the extensive crackdown the celebrations turned into anti-government protests, setting fire to pictures of leaders of the Iranian regime. The participants chanted slogans in support of Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, president-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI).
