IRGC - has the UK determined they are a terrorist organisation?

[timefordinner]

And if so could you link the source? I have just been going through lists and I can't find them.

Because they aren't there. Unless something changed today.

Not at the moment. Check this document, pages 26-27 talks about the IRGC and why they aren't on the list:

https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN00815/SN00815.pdf

Interesting @GentleSheep thank you.

The relevant part that relates to the IRGC:

There have been ongoing calls for the proscription of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in recent years during both the current and previous Parliament.

The IRGC is an Iranian state military and intelligence service, introduced following the 1979 revolution as a counterweight to Iran’s regular armed forces. Its external arm is proscribed by the US as a terrorist organisation.

The IRGC has been linked to kidnap and assassination plots in the UK. In March 2025 the Security Minister, Dan Jarvis, said that since the start of 2022, the UK had responded to 20 Iran-backed plots presenting potentially lethal threats to British citizens and UK residents.

In January 2023, the Commons debated, and agreed to, a motion on Iran which included a request for the government to proscribe the IRGC. In April 2023 and November 2023 a cross-party group of MPs and members of the House of Lords also wrote to the government urging proscription.

In January 2023 Jonathan Hall KC, the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, advised that proscribing the IRGC, as a state entity of Iran, under the Terrorism Act would be “at the risk of upsetting the settled meaning of terrorism in domestic law” which had, to date, excluded the armed forces of nation-states.

In September 2023, the UK’s Commissioner for Countering Extremism, Robin Simcox, said it was in the “national interest” to proscribe the IRGC as it supports proscribed groups around the world, and that it was “unsustainable” for it to remain legal for the IRGC to be hosted in UK institutions.

In his statement on Iran state threats in March 2025, Dan Jarvis said that it had become increasingly clear that “there are challenges inherent in applying our existing counter-terror legislation to state and state-linked threats to our national security”. He announced that he had therefore asked Jonathan Hall KC to review parts of the counter-terrorism framework that could be applied to modern-day state threats, such as those from Iran. This included giving specific consideration to a mechanism for proscribing state and state-linked bodies. He noted that as reviewer of both state threats and terrorism legislation Jonathan Hall was perfectly placed to undertake the review.

Jonathan Hall published his report on State Threats and Terrorism on 19 May 2025. He concluded that, as a matter of statutory interpretation, the proscription power provided for by the Terrorism Act 2000 could not be applied to state entities. As a result he recommended that the Secretary of State should have the power to issue a Statutory Alert and Liability Threat notice (SALT Notice). He made no observations as to whether such a power should be exercised against the IRGC.

The good news is that the government are bringing forward legislation in order to proscribe IRGC. This will deal with the issues raised in Jonathan Halls report.

The difficulty faced by this government is of course the same difficulty faced by previous governments and which explains why Sunak went as far as sanctioning the whole of the IRGC (not just individuals as would be usual) but could not proscribe without legislative changes.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/former-spy-chiefs-criticise-starmer-060000226.html?fr=sycsrp_catchall

From he article above his reasons are:

"The intervention comes after an Iranian-linked group claimed responsibility for an anti-Semitic firebomb attack in north London in the early hours of Monday.
Last week, two Iranian men were charged in a separate case with spying for Tehran over the alleged surveillance of Jewish people in London.
The group of former high-ranking British intelligence officials acknowledged that “speaking publicly is not the norm for our profession”, but said they “now feel compelled to act”.

“Iranian state actors and their proxies are already active inside the UK,” they said."

Scary stuff @Ihatetomatoes

Sir Ken McCallum, MI5’s director-general, revealed in October that the security service had stopped more than 20 Iran-linked plots on British soil in the last year. Intelligence sources anticipated that number would only increase amid the current conflict.

The IRGC is considered the primary exporter of Iranian-linked terrorism abroad, acting as a “praetorian guard” military force in Iran, swearing loyalty to the supreme leader personally and acting independently of the army.

This month, the global terrorism index said the elite military unit was linked to 157 terrorist plots across 15 countries in the past five years.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/former-spy-chiefs-criticise-starmer-060000226.html?fr=sycsrp_catchall

Interesting that they aren't proscribed.

Linked to so many terrorist plots.

The British Home Office confirms to The Times that it is preparing legislation to proscribe the IRGC, and sources say it will be ready later this year.

(Source: Times of Israel, January 2026).

But only against Iranian dissident and Jews so not 'US', remember? Honestly, I don't know what the fuss is about.

I appreciate the answers. I have been digging around and I don't think that Iran/IRGC is going to be proscribed, the whole issue is highly politicised but the prevailing view is that the Iranian state (government/IRGC etc) is not associated with terrorist attacks. Attacks like the ambulance attacks involved Iranians, but not acting as state agents. Also, it is interesting to note that it is this same government which Trump calls "reasonable" (he thought there had been a regime change, and it seems he wasn't aware that there was an acting government in place, he thought that the assassinations of the former Khomeini and Larijani meant there had been a regime change - I am beginning to wonder if he is being briefed at all).

At the moment the prevailing view in many countries is that the US war against Iran over nuclear weapons is illegal, and the US (Hegseth) is saying publicly that they have no intention of abiding by international law and that they will be bombing Iran back to the stone age by targeting bridges, water plants, electricity plants, carrying out assassinations so I think it is not seen as helpful to jump on their political bandwagon.

I have no idea why the US thinks that it is a good idea to be openly admitting things which are likely to be seen as war crimes.

@timefordinner time will tell if the IRCG are proscribed by the UK later this year.

I believe Starmer would like to but there are legal difficulties. Nevertheless, there is a lot of pressure on him to do so because the IRCG do get involved in a lot of terrorist activities and fund a lot of terrorists via groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah.

@timefordinner I don't know what fantasy world you live in but the assessment of our government and others and the security services is that the Iranian state is associated with terror attacks, spying and other hostile behaviour.

Thankfully the EU has proscribed them which is a big move, along with Canada and Sweden. We’ll probably follow as reported today.

Hi Sharon - how rude you are! Try to stay within MN guidelines in your replies, that is, try to be respectful.

What I said was exactly right. That there are reports as you say, but overall what I said was right.

One of the issues with them being proscribed is that it will make it harder for people to protest against illegal wars against them. We have all seen what happens when the US attacks ME countries and most people don't want to see that happening again, and support negotiation and diplomacy. The longer game is that we are more likely to be dragged into a war ourselves, and into WWIII, if sufficient public opinion doesn't stop the current madness.

I doubt that they will be proscribed for the reasons I gave above, though.

A lawyer here explains that the government sees little real value in proscribing but moreover the legal difficulties, and there is also a discussion about the point of proscribing generally:

I think we also need to bear in mind that it is unlikely that intelligence in the US advised Trump that Iran was an immediate threat, as leading staff have said previously that there is no enduring threat ideologically and no thread militarily if the US stays in the US, because the ballistic missiles won't reach the US from Iran. And we can see from the various high level televised debates that a large number of senior people in the US do not support the military action against Iran. And judging by what Trump and Hegseth are saying, there is a lack of briefing. So there are some strange loose ends when it comes to geopolitical perspectives here.

What is the pressure on countries to proscribe?

There is no possibility that the attacks on Iran are all about protecting the civilians as (a) evidence is growing that this is not what civilians want and (b) the marketing team US is being led by Lindsey Graham who I think considers himself more of a money man than a people's man.

Obviously we know that Israel wants to destroy Iran for many reasons.

The vast majority of people around the world are pushing for diplomacy and negotiation before it is too late. So this is indeed a reason why it is arguably unlikely that the UK will cave to pressure about proscription.

No, you are wrong. The reasons for the UK governnent not proscribing have been extensively set out. They do not mean that either the view of the UK government or 'the prevailing view' more widely is that the Iranian govt/ICRG is not involved in terrorist activity.

The video I linked has a veritable expert's view which is worth you watching. I think it is also worth you reading recent government reports which have comments on your second sentence. It isn't a black and white situation, but my summary was generally correct.
Glad to see you have toned down your language though, it is appreciated.

Agree. The issue has been the legal complexity of our legislation. Sunak introduced wide ranging sanctions in an attempt to circumvent the need for legislation. He also warned Labour of the complexity of the issue. The sanctions have been extended, but the next step should be legislative.

This is why the EU moved on it.

Speaking in Brussels on Thursday, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot described it as "the most violent repression in Iran's modern history" and said there could be "no impunity for the crimes committed".

I am not sure you read my post. I was talking about the US actions. You are talking about January protests in Iran? It seems that EU countries are not supporting US actions irrespective of their official stances on the protests.

The end of the video I linked has a small discussion about a recent torture case, I noticed. It isn't about Iran but I have seen a lot of your recent posts about torture generally so you might be interested if you are interested in that subject matter generally.

I was responding to the question on why the pressure to proscribe, but on the last line of the U.K. being unlikely to do it it was reported today they will soon.