OUTRAGE OVER FORMER IRGC COMMANDER’S VACATION IN CANADA

A short video went viral on Farsi social media showing Brigadier General Morteza Talaei exercising in a mixed gym in Canada (Screengrab/social media)

Fri 04 February 2022:

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Footages of an ultra-hardline Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander exercising in a fitness club in Canada sparked anger among Iranians, who highlighted his role in the brutal crackdown on students and widespread arrest of women for not wearing the hijab.

Last week, a short video and several photos went viral on Farsi social media showing Brigadier General Morteza Talaei in a mixed gym. Abdollah Abdi, an independent Iranian journalist who first published the video, said that the video was recorded in Greater Toronto’s Richmond Hill.

فیلم/ سردار مرتضی طلایی کجاست؟

بر اساس عکس‌ها و فیلم به دست رسیده مرتضی طلائی، نایب رئیس سابق شورای اسلامی شهر تهران و رئیس پلیس سابق تهران بزرگ که در سال هشتاد و پنج با درجه نظامی سردار سرتیپ دوم پاسدار بازنشسته شده بود اکنون در کاناد اقامت دارد و به زندگی مشغول است. https://t.co/Nrd8RkoRqC pic.twitter.com/7yHgYMIBzI

— عبداله عبدي «عبدی مدیا» (@abdolah_abdi) January 29, 2022

In an interview with Abdi, Talaei confirmed his travels to Canada but criticised him for “unethically” publishing a video of him in a public place.

Talaei’s criticism caused outrage among Iranians, who took to social media to remind him of when he organised a branch of the police to arrest women for not following what police defined as “appropriate hijab”.

سردار مرتضی طلایی کجاست؟

بر اساس عکس‌ها و فیلم به دست رسیده مرتضی طلائی، نایب رئیس سابق شورای اسلامی شهر تهران و رئیس پلیس سابق تهران بزرگ که در سال هشتاد و پنج با درجه نظامی سردار سرتیپ دوم پاسدار بازنشسته شده بود اکنون در کاناد اقامت دارد و به زندگی مشغول است. https://t.co/lIp0zaY0up pic.twitter.com/AjXSd495PD

— عبداله عبدي «عبدی مدیا» (@abdolah_abdi) January 29, 2022

“Former Tehran police chief said ‘people’s private life is no other people’s business’; it is of extreme obscenity to hear this from someone who had arrested thousands of women and men because of their ‘private life’,” an Iranian social media user wrote on Twitter.

Others criticised the Canadian government for granting a visa to an IRGC commander, one of the leading figures of the 1999 attack on university students’ dormitories and the student movement crackdown in 2003.

“The limitless obscenity of Talaei and people alike him is out of the question. The question is how these criminals can travel to the free world. Canada has turned into the backyard of the Islamic Republic’ criminals,” wrote another Twitter user.

Before being appointed to the police force, Talei was the commander of IRGC in the Iranian cities of Khonsar, Barkhar, Mimeh and Kashan. He was also the commander of the paramilitary Basij forces in Isfahan’s third district.

In 2005, after 28 years of service in the IRGC, he entered politics and joined the conservative parties in Iran.

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