Iran International
Canada says immigration applications are assessed individually in response to cases of Iranians who completed mandatory military service with the Revolutionary Guards receiving letters warning they could be deemed inadmissible on security grounds.
In a statement to Iran International, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) said “membership in the IRGC and service in the IRGC are distinct considerations” for assessing inadmissibility.
Individuals who served as a result of compulsory military service are assessed individually, the department said, adding that “conscription alone does not necessarily result in inadmissibility.”
IRCC said final decisions are made by immigration officers after reviewing submitted documents, relevant case law and recommendations from security partners, including the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS).
Conscripts receive fairness letters
Documents and accounts obtained by Iran International indicate that Iranian applicants whose only declared connection to the IRGC was compulsory military service have received Procedural Fairness Letters (PFLs) raising possible inadmissibility.
The letters notify applicants that their cases are being assessed under paragraph 34(1)(f) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) over possible membership in an organization believed to engage in terrorism.
A finding of inadmissibility can result in the refusal of an application for permanent residence and can also affect accompanying family members.
Iran International reviewed a PFL issued to an applicant on Aug. 6 that explicitly cited the applicant’s mandatory military service with the IRGC.
“On form IMM 5546, you indicated that you served your mandatory military service with the IRGC,” the letter said, giving the applicant 30 days to submit additional information before a decision is made.
IRGC designation and compulsory service
Canada designated the IRGC a terrorist entity under the Criminal Code in June 2024, after years of debate that included concerns over Iranians who had been conscripted into the force.
A separate measure expanded later that year makes senior Iranian government officials who served at any point since June 23, 2003 inadmissible to Canada.
IRCC said procedural fairness letters give applicants an opportunity to provide additional information before a final decision is made. Community advocates and legal representatives, however, say the recent volume of letters has created widespread uncertainty among Iranians with a history of compulsory IRGC service.
Advocates estimate that thousands of Iranian families in Canada could be affected by security reviews stemming from mandatory conscription.
Several applicants also told Iran International they had participated in anti-government demonstrations and human rights rallies since arriving in Canada and feared possible repercussions if they were eventually returned to Iran.
“We served in the military solely because it is mandatory under Iranian law,” one applicant said on condition of anonymity because of security concerns. “Yet, my spouse is now also facing potential inadmissibility.”
The applicant said they were hesitant to submit evidence detailing their opposition activities in Canada because they feared the information could endanger their family if they were ultimately forced to return to Iran.
IRCC said no final decision is made until information submitted by an applicant during the response period has been evaluated.
In the study of migration and bilingualism, Persian is, for many children of Iranian immigrants, a heritage language: a language passed down through family and cultural background while another language dominates their schooling and social world.
The term is not the same as mother tongue. A mother tongue is usually the first language learned in childhood; a heritage language may lose its dominant place very early, sometimes before the child can read a word of it.
For Iranians, this is not merely a question of language teaching. More than four decades of political, social and economic emigration have built a multigenerational society outside Iran, one now entering its third generation.
The question is no longer how many Persian words the children know. It is how much of the language, the family memory and the direct connection to Iran will reach the generations after them.
One generation weakens a language; the next can lose it
Starting school is one of the deepest turning points in a child's linguistic life. The host country's language is not just the language of lessons; it becomes the language of friendship, play, jokes, music, the internet and most of the child's social world. Even in a family where the parents speak Persian at home, the real share of Persian in the child's day shrinks, steadily and without anyone deciding it should.
The shift rarely happens suddenly. First the child understands Persian and answers in Persian. Then she still understands her parents but replies in the dominant language. Later, Persian narrows to family matters and daily routine, while feelings, schoolwork and personal disputes migrate to the other language.
Nor are understanding, speaking, reading and writing a single skill. A person may understand Persian almost completely yet grope for words when speaking, or speak fluently yet be unable to read a simple text. At that point, direct access to Persian literature, media, history and much of the written world of the language closes too.
The experience of other immigrant communities shows how deep the shift can run within two or three generations, a pattern sociolinguists have described since Joshua Fishman's classic model of three-generation language loss.
In the United States, 89 percent of first-generation Latino youth and 79 percent of the second generation report speaking Spanish well; in the third generation the figure falls to 38 percent, and only 26 percent report strong reading and writing.
Canadian data show the shift happening inside the family itself: in households where both immigrant parents shared the same non-official mother tongue, 24.4 percent of children used only English or French at home, against 2.5 percent of their parents.
These numbers are not about Iranians and cannot be transferred to them directly. But the pattern they draw is unambiguous: a language's strength in the first generation is no guarantee it will reach the third.
When the shared language shrinks, the hard conversations shrink with it
The consequences are not only cultural. One of the most consequential facts of immigrant family life is the gap that can open between the linguistic reach of parents and children.
A child usually learns the host country's language faster and deeper than her parents do. A father or mother may handle the new language perfectly well for work and errands, yet still feel a memory, an emotion or a complicated thought most precisely in Persian. The child may lack sufficient Persian in exactly those places.
In childhood the gap barely shows. School, food and tomorrow's plans need only a narrow band of language. Adolescence demands other conversations: anxiety, love, identity, discrimination, gender, politics, the future, the family's own disputes.
A shrinking common language does not by itself produce a family crisis, and the difficulties of immigrant families cannot be reduced to language. Economics, the migration experience itself, generational difference and social pressures all play their part. But the more complicated the conversation, the more the linguistic ceiling makes itself felt.
In Iranian families, the bond with the older generation carries its own weight. A child with limited Persian can manage daily talk with her grandparents. Hearing the story of a life, the memory of an emigration, an argument about history, is harder.
For a community whose modern experience is knotted together with revolution, war, repression, protest and wave after wave of departure, this is not only about preserving literature and culture. Language is one of the principal carriers of family and historical memory. The narrower it becomes, the more the next generation's access to its own family's lived experience will depend on summaries, and on translation.
The third generation: who will teach Persian, and with which Iran?
About the coming generations there is still no comprehensive data. Nobody knows how many Iranian children abroad understand Persian, how many speak it, how many can read and write it. Even the size of the diaspora resists precise measurement, because countries classify people differently, by birthplace, citizenship, ancestry, ethnicity or language.
Yet the third generation's challenge is already visible in outline. The first generation typically carried complete Persian out of Iran. The second may hold a reduced version: strong comprehension, weaker speech, little literacy. When that generation becomes parents, its narrower Persian is no longer a private matter; it directly constrains what can be passed to the next child.
For Iranians, teaching the language carries a political complication too. Many immigrant families are caught between the need to preserve Persian and their distrust of institutions that are official, or tied to the Islamic Republic. Not everyone has access to a Persian school, and some parents refuse to let their child's language lessons come bundled with religious instruction, ideological content or the state's official narrative of Iran's history and identity.
So the question is not only how Persian should be taught. It is who teaches it, with what content, and with which image of Iran.
A few hours of weekend class will not carry a language on their own. A language survives when a child has reasons to use it: books and media made for her age, friendships with other Persian speakers, and the ability to talk in Persian not only about home and food, but about her own world.
For part of the second generation, Persian is still the language of home but no longer the language of life. For the third, the question is more fundamental: will Persian remain the language of home at all?
That question is not only about the survival of a language. Its answer will decide how directly generations who may never live in Iran can reach their family's memory, their people's modern history and the Iranian experience itself; whether Iran, for them, will be a land whose language they know, or a story that always arrives in translation.
The poll drew nearly 100,000 responses, with 83% saying they would emigrate and 17% saying they would stay. Economic hardship, inflation, social restrictions and uncertainty about the future featured prominently in comments from respondents considering leaving.
“We didn't have money to emigrate before; now we don't even have money to live in Iran,” one respondent wrote. Another said that with the exchange rate reaching 2 million rials to the US dollar, even getting to the border had become unaffordable.
Many emphasized that their desire to leave stems from a basic wish for stability, dignity, and a normal life without constant anxiety. "We only get one chance at life and youth, and I wish we could spend it somewhere in good spirits," one respondent wrote. "Why should we keep waiting years for Iran to be fixed?"
The findings align with independent research on societal hopelessness in the country. A poll conducted in March 2024 by the Washington-based Stasis Institute found that 76 percent of Iranians believed young people saw no successful future for themselves in Iran, a figure that rose to 82 percent among those aged 18 to 29.
According to United Nations data, more than 4.14 million Iranians have sought asylum abroad since 1980. Iran International estimates that an additional two million Iranians have emigrated through legal channels, meaning roughly one in every 15 Iranians now lives abroad, out of a population of 87 million. Unofficial estimates place the first-generation Iranian diaspora at over eight million.
Economic strain and brain drain
Persistent inflation, eroding purchasing power and limited job opportunities remain among the main factors driving the desire to leave. Iran has consistently ranked among the leading countries of origin for international students in North America and Europe and ranks fourth worldwide as a source of doctoral students in the United States.
Socio-political restrictions, air pollution, and declining public infrastructure further exacerbate the sense of impasse. Foreign diplomatic operations in Iran have also slowed following recent regional escalations, leaving many visa applications halted and adding to public frustration.
Sociologist Hossein Ghazian previously told Iran International that push factors within Iran have consistently played a greater role in driving emigration than opportunities abroad. As those domestic pressures intensify, he said, the desire to leave is likely to grow.
Resistance versus departure
Despite the overwhelming majority favoring emigration, a segment of respondents rejected the idea, framing it as a surrender to the Islamic Republic. Some argued that remaining in Iran to demand political change is the only viable path forward.
"Emigrating means giving up," one respondent wrote. "Instead, we should rebuild Iran." Another added: "No, the ones who should leave are the Islamic Republic."
Others cited the popular protest song Suroud-e Zan (Women's Anthem) by Singer Mehdi Yarrahi, echoing its line: "Why travel? Stay and take it back."
For many, the decision remains contingent on the political regime itself. "If Iran were in good shape, never, but with the clerics in power, yes," one comment read.
For others, family ties remain the sole anchor. One woman noted she would have left two decades ago were it not for her mother, while another said she still hoped to build a better future for her children, even as she felt her own youth had slipped away.
As economic pressures intensify, the debate between leaving for stability and staying to push for change continues to define the daily reality of millions of Iranians.
The six decrees named Ali Abdollahi chief of staff of the armed forces, with Kioumars Heydari as his deputy; Ahmad Vahidi commander-in-chief of the Revolutionary Guards, with Mostafa Izadi as his deputy; Ali Azmaei commander of the Guards' navy; and Hossein Taeb, the feared former intelligence chief of the Guards, head of the Basij.
Separately, Mohsen Rezaei, the former Guards commander named Khamenei's military adviser in March, became secretary of the Supreme National Security Council and the leader's representative on the body.
The appointments put veterans of the Guards, intelligence services and Iran-Iraq war generation across the upper reaches of the security establishment. But rather than marking a wholesale changing of the guard, they draw heavily on figures who built their careers under Ali Khamenei — leaving open whether the new supreme leader is imposing his authority on the system or assembling an experienced security bloc whose support he needs to exercise it.
Khamenei's directives suggest the changes are not simply about personnel. In his appointment decree for Vahidi, he called for strengthening the force's capabilities for “maximum deterrence” and maintaining readiness to carry out “powerful offensive operations against the enemy.”
Lawmaker Ebrahim Rezaei described the appointments as “basically an indication of the fact that the Islamic Republic is moving toward a more offensive military structure.”
War commanders move to the top
The clearest sign that Khamenei may be changing how the military is run, rather than merely replacing its commanders, lies in the elevation of Abdollahi and Heydari from the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters to the two highest positions in the Armed Forces General Staff.
The General Staff is Iran's highest military coordinating body, while Khatam Central Headquarters has a more operational wartime role, coordinating military activity across different branches.
There has been no confirmed announcement that the two bodies have formally merged, but pro-establishment commentator Mohammad-Sadegh Alizadeh said the appointments confirmed a process of centralizing Iran's military command.
“The merger of Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters and the Armed Forces General Staff means concentrating the country's wartime, military and offensive activities,” he wrote on X, adding that Abdollahi's decree explicitly tasked him with completing the process.
Abdollahi previously served as coordination deputy of the General Staff and deputy commander of Iran's police. Heydari commanded the regular Army Ground Forces for more than seven years before moving into Khatam's command structure in late 2025.
Heydari's appointment also preserves a senior regular Army presence near the top of a leadership heavily populated by Revolutionary Guards veterans, suggesting that greater centralization does not necessarily amount to straightforward IRGC domination of the command structure.
Taeb’s return puts domestic security in focus
If the Abdollahi and Heydari appointments point to tighter wartime command, Taeb's return to the Basij reveals the domestic-security side of Khamenei's emerging structure.
Taeb commanded the Basij during the unrest following Iran's disputed 2009 presidential election and later spent more than a decade heading the IRGC Intelligence Organization before his removal in 2022.
Khamenei's decree calls for strengthening what it describes as the Basij's “popular intelligence network,” drawing attention to the surveillance and internal-security component of Taeb's mandate.
New York-based journalist and Middle East writer Séamus Malekafzali said Taeb's return was particularly significant given his intelligence background.
“Taeb spent 13 years after leaving the Basij as the head of IRGC intelligence,” he wrote on X on August 10. Referring to Khamenei's directive for a “grassroots confrontation with enemy threats,” he added that it “certainly sounds like making sure the January protests never happen again.”
Taeb has also long been identified with Mojtaba Khamenei's security network. When he was removed as IRGC intelligence chief in 2022, Jason Brodsky, policy director at United Against Nuclear Iran, described the move as “an earthquake in Iran's intelligence community,” noting his close relationship with both Ali Khamenei and his son.
His return therefore restores a longtime Khamenei confidant to command of an organization embedded across universities, workplaces, neighborhoods and state institutions, and which has played a central role in surveillance, political mobilization and the suppression of protests.
Journalist Morteza Kazemian linked the appointment to worsening economic conditions and public discontent, arguing that Taeb had become one of Khamenei's trusted instruments of security and governance and that the Basij under his command was intended to embody the leadership's “iron fist.”
Rezaei comeback underscores reliance on old guard
If Taeb's return highlights Khamenei's reliance on trusted security figures, Rezaei's comeback makes the generational continuity harder to miss.
Rezaei commanded the Revolutionary Guards from 1981 to 1997, including through most of the Iran-Iraq war, before moving into politics and holding a succession of senior state positions.
He later served at the Expediency Council, repeatedly ran for president and became vice president for economic affairs under Ebrahim Raisi. Khamenei appointed him military adviser in March before naming him secretary of the Supreme National Security Council and his representative on the body less than five months later.
Journalist Ahmad Zeidabadi questioned why Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr had been replaced by Rezaei and what substantive change the appointment was intended to bring.
“What does the appointment of Mohsen Rezaei in place of Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr as secretary of the Supreme National Security Council mean, and what change is it supposed to bring to the way this position operates?” he wrote on X.
Some Iranian social-media users responded with mockery, reviving jokes surrounding Rezaei's repeated presidential campaigns and decades-long circulation through senior state positions.
The criticism reflected one of the broader themes surrounding the reshuffle: that Khamenei's first major appointments have elevated not a new generation of officials, but men who have occupied the Islamic Republic's military and political establishment for decades.
Vahidi promotion highlights hardline continuity
Vahidi's promotion adds another dimension to that continuity: the elevation of a commander whose record spans Iran's external military operations and domestic repression.
Vahidi had served as acting Guards commander following Mohammad Pakpour's death during the war with the United States and Israel. Khamenei formally installed him as commander and promoted him to major general.
He previously held senior roles in the Quds Force and served as defense minister under Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and interior minister under Ebrahim Raisi.
Argentine prosecutors have sought Vahidi in connection with the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, which killed 85 people. Iran denies involvement.
Israel's foreign ministry focused its response to the reshuffle on Vahidi and Rezaei, linking both men to allegations surrounding the AMIA case and accusing Tehran of elevating figures associated with attacks abroad.
“The Iranian regime worships terror, rewards its architects and promotes them to the highest levels of power,” the ministry said on X.
The United States has also sanctioned Vahidi over his role as interior minister during the suppression of protests following Mahsa Amini's death in custody in 2022.
But the wartime record of Vahidi, Abdollahi and Taeb also complicates the idea that their elevation simply represents Khamenei extending his personal control over the security apparatus.
President Masoud Pezeshkian accused Vahidi and Abdollahi of taking unilateral military actions that undermined efforts to secure a ceasefire, Iran International reported in April. The report also described a heated confrontation involving Taeb.
All three men now occupy senior positions in the military-security structure under Khamenei, raising the possibility that the new leader has elevated figures whose institutional power was already considerable before he formally appointed them.
Khamenei’s first imprint on security establishment
Several major international outlets interpreted the reshuffle as an early indication of how Khamenei intends to shape the security establishment after succeeding his father.
The Wall Street Journal portrayed the appointments as Khamenei putting his stamp on the national-security system and signaling a tougher approach toward Washington.
“Iran's mysterious ruler signals a hard line on Trump with new leadership,” the newspaper wrote.
The Financial Times focused on the promotion of loyalists and the possibility that Rezaei's return could point toward a harder line on the United States, while Reuters described Rezaei as a close ally of Khamenei and highlighted his recent opposition to extending a ceasefire and his skepticism toward negotiations with Washington.
Those readings emphasize Khamenei's role in choosing the new hierarchy. But the identities of the men he chose point just as strongly to continuity with the security establishment inherited from his father.
Iran International analysts had raised that tension even before the latest decrees.
The deaths of Ali Khamenei and other senior officials created a leadership gap in which his successor was still working to consolidate his position, Kazemian said in May.
After the appointments were announced, journalist Kamyar Behrang argued that the death of Ali Khamenei, who had served as the system's final arbiter, had given the Revolutionary Guards greater room to shape the political order that followed him.
The appointments can therefore be read in both directions. Khamenei is placing his own stamp on the military and security hierarchy, centralizing command and restoring trusted figures to key posts.
But he is doing so largely through men formed under his father's rule — veteran commanders and intelligence officials whose institutional weight may be as important to his authority as their loyalty to him.
The first map of power under Mojtaba Khamenei is taking shape. What remains unclear is whether these men are primarily instruments of his control, or the establishment on which that control depends.
“Cafe and restaurant outings are a form of recreation and something people look forward to, but inflation and rising costs have deprived many people even of that,” one audience member wrote.
Responses to an Iran International question about monthly cafe spending ranged from zero to hundreds of millions of rials. For many respondents, however, “nothing” and “zero” were the recurring answers.
When essentials leave Iranians nothing for a coffee
Several people said they had not visited a cafe or restaurant for months or years because rent, utility bills, medical care, food and debt payments had taken priority.
“How much do we earn in this inflation for anything to be left for recreation? We work from morning until night and can only pay the rent,” one person wrote.
Another said even buying enough food had become difficult.
“We are trying to be able to provide two meals a day. Going to a cafe has become completely out of reach for us,” the respondent wrote.
Healthcare expenses featured repeatedly in the messages. One person said a root canal on August 10 cost 120 million rials ($65), leaving no money for leisure or cafe visits.
Many Iranian workers earn around 200 million to 250 million rials ($108-$134) a month. The rial trades at around 1.86 million to the dollar on the free market.
Another, a retired education worker, said even one restaurant or cafe visit a year was unaffordable.
“I pay for medicine and doctors in installments,” the retiree wrote.
Others described a gradual erosion of living standards rather than a sudden end to leisure spending. One said the family had gone to cafes or restaurants around three times a month until relatively recently but was now buying basic necessities on credit.
“Expenses such as cafes and restaurants, recreation and travel disappeared a long time ago, and only essential costs such as healthcare, food, rent and installments remain,” another person wrote.
Some said even those essentials were becoming increasingly difficult to afford.
“We have become dependent on money for our daily bread. Where would we find money for cafes or eating out? Buying fruit has become a dream for us,” one person wrote.
Another said the family had been unable to afford recreation or leisure activities for about one or two years and believed much of society was focused primarily on getting by.
A simple cafe order costs millions of rials
Prices listed by cafes on SnappFood application show how quickly even relatively simple orders can add up.
An Americano at cafes reviewed by Iran International started at about 1.1 million rials ($0.59) and reached roughly 3.8 million rials ($2.04) at some establishments. Espresso prices exceeded 3 million rials ($1.61) in some cases.
Breakfast dishes started at around 2 million rials ($1.08) at some cafes, while options including omelets or bread, cheese and herbs could cost more than 4 million rials ($2.15).
One said two drinks and a slice of cake for two people now cost about 12 million rials ($6.45).
Another calculated that buying only a morning espresso every day would cost 60 million to 70 million rials ($32-$38) a month.
Prices vary substantially by city, neighborhood and establishment, but several cafe visits each week can push monthly spending into tens of millions of rials.
Millions spent to preserve a social life
Not everyone has stopped going. Some said they deliberately continued setting aside money for cafes despite rising costs, describing the outings as one of their remaining opportunities for socializing and escaping daily pressures.
Monthly spending among this group commonly ranged from 50 million to 100 million rials ($27-$54), according to figures respondents provided, with some putting their spending at 150 million to 200 million rials ($81-$108) or as much as 300 million rials ($161).
“Every day I buy a shot of coffee and a small bottle of water from a cafe, and maybe a vitamin C drink. I calculated that it comes to around 50 million rials ($27) a month,” one person wrote.
Another said they visited cafes at least 20 times a month.
The spending does not necessarily reflect financial comfort, according to some of the messages. Citizens described paying for cafes as a way to preserve a fragment of ordinary social life despite the squeeze on household budgets.
One person estimated that under current prices, even a relatively frugal young person could face monthly expenses of 150 million to 300 million rials ($81-$161), rising to between 400 million and 700 million rials ($215-$376) with greater spending, whether on cafes or other necessities.
Cafe owners squeezed by debt and closures
Cafe owners and workers who contacted Iran International described the other side of the contraction in discretionary spending: fewer customers alongside rising operating costs and debt.
One respondent from Khuzestan said debt had forced them out of business.
“I have been unemployed for two months because of debt, I lost my cafe, my bank installments are overdue and there is nothing I can do,” the person wrote.
Businesses also face closures linked to enforcement of Iran's mandatory hijab rules. Another pointed to cafes being sealed in Qazvin over compliance with the dress code.
For many, cafe outings have therefore become another measure of shrinking household choices: eliminated altogether by some families and maintained at considerable cost by others seeking a few hours of social life outside the pressures of everyday expenses.
