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Ahmad-Reza Radan
Ahmad-Reza Radan (Persian: احمدرضا رادان) is an Iranian military officer who has served as Iran's Chief of police, the chief commander of the Law Enforcement Command of the Islamic Republic of Iran, since January 2023. His father, of Afghan origin, immigrated to Iran from Afghanistan's Takhar province in 1950. He was deputy commander of the Iranian police[1] and Tehran's police chief, infamous for his crackdown on "un-Islamic" hair and dress styles.[2] Radan started his career as a member of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards during the Iran–Iraq War. He also served as a commander during the war. Radan held various posts in the Islamic Republic of Iran Police (IRIP), including police commander of Razavi Khorasan Province. During the war, he was injured more than four times but returned to the war zone to defend his country against Iraqi forces.[citation needed] Radan is well known for his actions regarding the Islamic dress code, the distribution of illegal drugs, and controlling gangs. He served as police commander of Kurdistan Province, Sistan and Baluchestan Province, Khorasan Province, and Tehran Province, the most crucial province in Iran. In 2009, he opposed the Iranian Green Movement and was sanctioned by the United States, and later the European Union, for human rights abuses.[3] The United States has designated Radan as a person who is, "among other things, responsible for or complicit in, or responsible for ordering, controlling, or otherwise directing, the commission of serious human rights abuses against citizens of Iran or their family members."[4] Public Security Plan and Moralization CampaignIn 2007, Ahmad-Reza Radan launched a "Public Security Plan". The police arrested dozens of "thugs" to increase public security. These individuals were sometimes beaten on camera in front of neighborhood inhabitants or forced to wear hanging watering cans used for lavatory ablutions around their necks.[5] Among those arrested was Meysam Lotfi, a young Iranian who was previously arrested during the Iran student riots in July 1999 and jailed for six months. According to his parents, he has never had any criminal record or background of illegal activities and had never been arrested or jailed before, omitting the 1999 riots.[6][7][8][9] Lotfi was listed for execution, a sentence that was later changed to a three-year prison sentence after media coverage and the attempts of his parents, as well as human rights activists.[10] His former lawyer was Abdolfattah Soltani.[6][11][12] SyriaIn 2011, Radan traveled to Damascus to support Syrian security services in their crackdown on protests in Syria.[13][14] Notes
External links
 Wikimedia Commons has media related to Ahmad-Reza Radan.
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