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Statue of slain Iranian commander Qassim Soleimani set on fire hours after it is unveiled
Rare act of defiance contrasted with depictions of the commander, killed by a US drone strike in 2020, as a widely loved hero in Iran
A statue of assassinated Iranian general Qassem Soleimani was vandalised hours after its inauguration in an Iranian provincial capital on Wednesday, in a rare act of defiance undercutting official veneration of the late military leader.
The six-metre high statue was set on fire hours after its official unveiling in Shahrekord, near Esfahan, where it was installed to commemorate the commander, who was killed by a US drone in Baghdad two years ago, the semi-official Iranian Students News Agency reported.
The perpetrators were unknown, said Mohammad Ali Nekonam, a provincial representative of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, calling it a “brazen act” of desecration.
It was not clear whether the statue was severely damaged but its vandalism contrasted sharply with portrayals of Soleimani - who led the republic's elite Qods force and masterminded campaigns in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon - as a widely loved hero inside Iran.
Hundreds of thousands of Iranians in cities across the country attended funeral processions for the commander in January 2020. At least 56 people died and thousands were injured in crushes and stampedes as huge crowds thronged the streets of Solelimani's home city of Kerman.
His death was also commemorated across the region by pro-Iran groups, which carried out a series of small-scale retaliatory attacks. In Iraq, armed drones – one bearing the message “Soleimani’s revenge” - were shot down approaching American forces stationed at Baghdad airport and Ain Al Asad base in Anbar province.
But exiled opposition group the National Council of Resistance of Iran – which said "resistance units" had torched the statue in Shahrekord – called Soleimani a “mass murderer”.
The NCRI is the diplomatic wing of the People's Mujahedin of Iran (MEK), an Iranian opposition movement that seeks to overthrow the Tehran government. Some former members of the group accuse it of turning into a cult while in exile, which it strongly denies.
During a crackdown against opposition groups in Iran in 1988, thousands of prisoners and MEK members were killed in mass extrajudicial executions, in which the NCRI said Soleimani was implicated.