http://www.iranfocus.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=3D5921
Iran readies to fend off =E2=80=9Cenemy assaults=E2=80=9D on capital
Sat. 25 Feb 2006
Iran Focus
Tehran, Iran, Feb. 25 =E2=80=93 Radical Islamist militiamen affiliated to
Iran=E2=80=99s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps staged military exercises
in the western suburbs of Tehran on Friday to defend the Iranian
capital against =E2=80=9Cenemy assaults=E2=80=9D, a government-run news age=
ncy
reported.
Some 2,500 members of the paramilitary Bassij took part in Friday
morning=E2=80=99s military drills in Qods (Jerusalem) Garrison in Tehran=E2=
=80=99s
Garm-Darreh district.
=E2=80=9CIn the military exercises, the Bassij forces destroyed the positio=
ns
of enemy forces who had been ferried to Tehran by helicopters and
mopped up the drop zone=E2=80=9D, Isca-News reported.
=E2=80=9CThe Bassij forces accomplished more than 90 percent of their
mission=E2=80=9D, the report added.
Deputy Commander of the Bassij forces in Tehran, Brigadier General
Ahmad Zolqadr, attended the rally. Zolqadr=E2=80=99s brother, Mohammad-Baqe=
r,
is a top IRGC commander who was recently appointed as Deputy Interior
Minister.
While the Revolutionary Guards and the Bassij regularly stage military
and security exercises in Tehran and its suburbs, it is the first time
that the objective of the war games is to destroy heliborne =E2=80=9Cenemy
forces=E2=80=9D in the Iranian capital.
The exercises were code-named Imam Hassan Askari, one of the two Shia
Imams whose shrine was destroyed this week in Samarra, Iraq.
The Supreme Commander of the IRGC announced on Thursday that God and
Muslims would carry out a retaliatory strike against the United States,
Britain, and Israel, who he alleged were behind Wednesday=E2=80=99s attack =
in
Samarra.
Iran=E2=80=99s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and hard-line President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad each separately announced that the attack on the
revered shrine was the work of agents of =E2=80=9Cthe occupiers of Iraq and
the Zionists=E2=80=9D.=20
=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D
.
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