Iran Revolutionary Guard colonel shot and slain by assailants on motorcycles in Tehran

On Sunday afternoon, a senior member of Iran's Revolutionary Guards Quads Forces, Col. Hassan Sayad Khodayari was assassinated by gunmen who arrived on two motorcycles in Tehran, reported state-run Tasnim news agency. Khodayari was shot five times while sitting in his car in front of his Tehran residence at 4:00 pm local time.

The Guards blamed the assassination on "elements linked to global arrogance," referring to the US and its allies, as per media reports. This claim thereby raised the possibilities of potential motorbike attacks in Iran in future, targeting the country's nuclear scientists. Since 2010, at least six Iranian scientists and academics have been slain or attacked, many of them carried out by assailants on motorbikes in instances thought to be related to Iran's nuclear program, which, the West claims is aimed at devising a nuclear arsenal.

The target was described as a "defender of the shrine"

The target was described as a "defender of the shrine," a reference to Iranians in the Guard's special Quds force, which handles operations abroad, who battle against the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, as per the media reports. Iran has been deploying militants to Syria since the commencement of the civil war to assist its partner in its struggle against Sunni insurgents. It is pertinent to mention here that one claimed responsibility for the attack.

In the meantime, members of an Israeli espionage network functioning in the nation were discovered and captured by the Iran Revolutionary Guard's security forces. The Guards stated that an investigation has been launched to identify the perpetrators and within hours, the prosecutor in Tehran arrived at the crime scene to investigate and requested that the offenders be apprehended immediately.

It was announced that the security forces are tracking the alleged perpetrators without providing any additional information, according to media reports. Khodayari was named as a colonel by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, the military's ideological wing. Images of a man, supposed to be Khodayari slumped in the driver's seat of a car, with blood all around his blue shirt and on his right upper arm were shared on Twitter. He is restrained by his seat belt, and the passenger side front glass has been blown out.

Image: AP