Criticism from Parliament Member on 'Shortcomings' in Securing Ahvaz Parade

A member of the National Security Commission of the Islamic Consultative Assembly criticized the security situation at the Ahvaz parade on Wednesday, noting that the attackers shot for '12 minutes' during the military parade and 'no one even shot back at them.' According to the official news agency of the Parliament, House of the Nation, Hossein Naqavi Hosseini expressed strong criticism of the 'security situation' of the parade held on September 21 after a meeting with the ministers of interior and intelligence, representatives from the army, the IRGC, police, and the governor of Khuzestan. He reported that during the meeting, 'two distressing videos' were shown, revealing that 'four terrorists shot for 12 minutes, moved around, changed their magazines, talked to each other, and no one even shot back at them.' Naqavi Hosseini expressed regret that the attackers 'moved freely during this time and even executed the wounded.' This representative, like other officials of the Islamic Republic, accused the U.S., Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates of being involved in the attack that left at least 24 dead and over 60 injured. However, he added that 'there were many weaknesses in securing, guarding, and protecting the environment of the program, and this weakness is from us.' This member of the National Security and Foreign Policy Commission also criticized that 'the green space behind the podium was devoid of any supervision, and terrorists could easily come and shoot at the people with weapons.' According to Naqavi Hosseini, in one of the videos shown in the National Security Commission, 'one of these terrorists came the morning before the parade and completely operationally surveyed the environment; that is, he walked from one end of the street to the other, and there was no security or supervisory force present there.' He stated that 'we will not overlook these errors, and the relevant agencies must be held accountable,' adding that 'we will identify and announce those who were negligent in securing the parade.' Naqavi Hosseini also referred to the discovery of a 'safe house' belonging to the attackers and the detention of '22 individuals related to them,' questioning, 'Why does this happen after the operation? Intelligence should not only go after the operation to discover these things.' The Islamic State group published a video on the 'Amaq' site claiming to show images and statements from three of the four attackers involved in the military parade attack in Ahvaz. Iranian officials had previously announced that the four armed attackers were killed in response by the military present at the scene. However, the Ministry of Intelligence stated that there were five attackers. Naqavi Hosseini's remarks about the 'security weakness' of the responsible agencies in securing this event come at a time when officials of the Islamic Republic have repeatedly claimed that with 'complete intelligence-security oversight' over the country and its borders, they have always thwarted 'terrorists.' Following the June 2017 attack by several members of the ISIS group on the Islamic Consultative Assembly and the tomb of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, which left 22 dead (including five attackers), similar criticisms were raised regarding the security of the Parliament building. Masoud Pezeshkian, the then-first deputy speaker of the Parliament who was presiding over the public session at the time of the attack, stated, 'It is unacceptable that three or even 30 people can easily enter this system; they should not have been able to easily bring weapons into the Parliament, and we expected the (security) system to stand against them and act, and there has been negligence in this regard.'