General Intelligence Service (Zorasan)

General Intelligence Service

اجمل اطلاعات خدمت Ajmal-e Ettelaat-e Khidmat
Seal
Agency overview
Formed	1980
Type	Intelligence agency
Jurisdiction	Zorasan
Employees	Classified
Annual budget	Classified
Minister responsible	Adavazdar Golzadari, Chairman of the Central Command Council
Agency executives	Saeed Deghan, Director-Commander Abdullah Haddad, Deputy Director-Commander
Parent department	Inter-Services Strategic Intelligence Unit
Parent agency	Central Command Council
Child agencies	Inter-Services Communications Unit Inter-Services Cyber Unit

The General Intelligence Service (Pasdani: اجمل اطلاعات خدمت; Ajmal-e Ettelaat-e Khidmat; Rahelian: جهاز المخابرات العامة; Ḵidma al-Mukhabarat al-Amma), commonly known by the abbreviation AKHIDAT (Ajmal-e Ettelaat-e Khidmat; Pasdani: اخیدات Rahelian: ;أخيدات) is the domestic and foreign military intelligence agency of the Central Command Council and the Revolutionary Military Command of the Armed Forces. Unlike the Union Ministry of State Intelligence and Security (MSIS), the General Intelligence Service heads report directly to the Central Command Council and is subordinate to the Zorasani military command structure. Despite its founding goal to be the gathering and protection of military intelligence, since its inception in 1980, the Akhidat has expanded its role in domestic matters, conducting operations similar to MSIS against domestic threats or opponents. Since 2012, Akhidat has also maintained control over the Inter-Services Cyber Unit (cyberwarfare), the Inter-Services Communications Unit (signals intelligence) and the Takavaran Corps (special forces).

The Akhidat is reportedly Zorasan's largest intelligence agency, and is the one primarily responsible for domestic operations against perceived enemies and threats to the Zorasani civic-military regime. The Akhidat according to Hossein Abdolrahimi in 2013, claimed that it had deployed over ten-times more agents to foreign agents than MSIS and through its control of the Takavaran Corps possesed up to 12,000 elite special forces troops.

History

Akhidat was formed on 1 January 1980, the same day the Union of Zorasani Irfanic Republics was established. It is the legal successor to the Military Intelligence Service of the Union of Khazestan and Pardaran. Between 1980 and 1990, its primary focus was assisting the Union Ministry of State Intelligence and Security in combating Irvadi, Riyadhi and Rahelian nationalists who opposed Zorasani Unification. Akhidat played a prominent role in the Al-Thawra Rebellion and the Al-Hizan Uprising. By the late 1980s, the domestic situation had calmed and the level of integration of Riyadha and Irvadistan into the UZIR was increasing dramatically, however, Akhidat remained active in domestic affairs until the early 1990s.

With the onset of the Saffron Era with the election of the liberal-reformist Abdelraouf Wazzan and Faris-Ali Erekat and the rollback of military influence over political matters, Akhidat was steadily removed from the domestic sphere. Between 1992 and 2004, Akhidat was consigned solely to its military intelligence tasks. However, as tensions rose between the liberal government and the military over the former's planned reforms entering the 2000s, Akhidat was claimed to have placed several ministers under surveillance. In 2006, Daryush Bakhtiar, an Akhidat agent who defected to Gaullica in 2002, said, "they placed the entire government under surveillance, from the State President, to the First Minister, down to the Sub-Secretary for National Parks and Marine Sanctuaries. The plan was to find any skeleton, any hidden secret that would bring the whole government crashing down." Bakhtiar also claimed the rise of and effectiveness of the Black Hand of International Liberation was mostly due to the Akhidat witholding key information and evidence from the Union Ministry of State Intelligence and Security, enabling the group to conduct attacks in Zorasan against the union-government.

In wake of the Tufan (2005-2008), which saw the defeat of the liberal-reformist political movement and the restoration of Sattarist government, Akhidat's role in domestic matters increased markedly. The 2008 constitution which granted the Zorasani armed forces considerable powers and influence over government and politics, also mandated a domestic role for the service. By 2012, Akhidat had surpassed MSIS as the principal internal security service, however, Akhidat's actions domestically grew increasingly focused on repression and the persecution of critics and opponents of the civic-military state. From 2012, it was believed to have re-established a vast network of informants across Zorasan, openly competing with MSIS for human intelligence within the country.

In 2014, leading member of the Central Command Council, major general Ataollah Shamshiri was appointed Director-Commander and oversaw a significant reorganisation, modernisation and shakeup of the service. This included the transfer of Zorasan's signals intelligence and cyberwarfare agencies under Akhidat's control. In 2015, Akhidat was blamed for series of cyber-attacks on Euclean companies and over 3,500 cases of intellectual property theft.

In 2017, General Saeed Deghan was appointed Director-Commander. Select sources claimed that between 2017 and 2019, Akhidat has spent considerable resources expanding its cyber capabilities. In late 2017, Akhidat was credited for the capture of Azgar Dirbaz, a leading Kexri nationalist insurgent leader.

In 2018, Daryush Bakhtiar warned that "Akhidat's presence in Euclea has never been larger or more pervasive." During a televised interview in Estmere, the defector claimed that "Akhidat is enacting Tahleel in Euclea, a word that translates as assimilation, but also, corrosion. It is the long-term infiltration of foreign societies with the ultimate aim of sowing discord and chaos."

On 6 July 2019, Akhidat was directly accused of orchestrating the Assassination of Assad Erekat, a former government minister who fled Zorasan in wake of the Tufan. At least 11 individuals, 10 of whom were Estmerish-Tsabaran were arrested and found to be a small Akhidat spy-ring based in the city of XX. The ensuing fallout led to the 15 July Incident, a brief naval stand-off between Estmere and Zorasan. Bakhtiar again on July 22, warned, "one must not view the asssassination of Erekat as a singular event, but rather, one piece of a much larger thread." The same year, Akhidat was involved directly in the arrest over 30 members of the Supreme Assembly of the Union over a four month period, the vast majority of charges against them in relation to undermining the Civic-Military State. These arrests resulting in the MPs expulsion from parliament was key to the landslide re-election of the True Way alliance to government in the 2019 Zorasani federal election.

In September 2020, Akhidat was accused by the Tsabaran government of conducting the cyber-attack that caused the Southwestern Tsabaran Blackout, coinciding with several ballistic missile attacks by the Irfanic Liberation and Resistance rebel forces. Though not definitively proven, many analysts stated that if caused by a cyber-attack, the blackout which affected over 27 million people and caused billions in economic damage, constituted the most devastating cyber act in history to date.

Organisation

The Akhidat is subordinate to the Zorasani military command and its overarching leadership body, the Central Command Council. According to public source information, the Akhidat is not held accountable to either the civlian executive or the national legislature and its budget is pre-determined each financial year under the "National Security Provision", which enables the military to devise its own annual budget with limited input from the government. The Akhidat itself is divided into "Divisions" (Laškar) and then into "Sections" (Bakhš), which are in turn divided into "Units" (Daneh).

• First Division: is responsible for domestic operations.
  • First Section: is responsible for internal state security and counter-intelligence.
    • Internal Security Affairs Unit: believed to be responsible for domestic operations against critics of the civic-military state.
  • Second Section: is responsible for domestic signals and communications security.
    • Inter-Services Cyber Unit: the national cyberwarfare service.
    • Inter-Services Communications Unit: the national signals intelligence service.
• Second Division: is responsible for foreign operations.
  • First Section: geographically responsible for Coius.
  • Second Section: geographically responsible for Euclea.
  • Third Section: geographically responsible for Asteria Superior.
  • Fourth Section: geographically responsible for Asteria Inferior.
• Third Division: is responsible for analytics.
  • First Section: is responsible for military technology.
  • Second Section: is responsible for war economics.
  • Third Section: is responsible for strategic doctrines and arms.
  • Fourth Section: is responsible for information warfare.

Methods and activities

As Akhidat operates both domestically and externally, the list of activities is extensive. Its methods for domestic counterintelligence and repression are becoming more complex and sophisticated. Externally, Akhidat is believed to operate SIGINT stations in every Zorasani embassy and consulate around the world.

The Kord Mir Detention Centre is located east of Zahedan and is believed to be a prison exclusively for Akhidat use.

In domestic operations, either as counterintelligence or repression of critics or opponents of the Civic-Military State, Akhidat has surpassed the Union Ministry for State Intelligence and Security (MSIS) as the primary service. Since 1980, Akhidat has reportedly spent large sums of money establishing a vast network of informants, while its subordination to the Central Command Council has enabled it to utilise the military’s stake in the Union Corporation for General Construction to gain unparalleled access to social housing. In 2013, an Akhidat defector anonymously told the Azadi newspaper that Akhidat had used UCGC to plant surveillance equipment inside social housing to maintain a constant watch on citizens. In 2014, it was claimed by another that Akhidat operated bugging devices in every classroom, though this was later countered by six other sources that MSIS is the agency that watches classrooms.

One key area of interest to Akhidat domestically is the internet. According to several sources inside the agency, it has a dedicated social media unit with over 8,500 officers. The social media unit purportedly studies the posts and comments of Zorasani users for anti-government messages or opinions deemed subversive. However, one method of online surveillance and repression used by Akhidat is known as “imitation” (تقلید, Taghleed) and involves agents posing as anti-government activists, who then use social media to draw out likeminded citizens through group chats or fake events. In one such instance, a group of 33 university students from across northwest Zorasan were led to believe they were talking with an activist, who duly organised a meeting to discuss “civic action.” Of the 33, 30 left their homes for the meeting and were disappeared. Akhidat is also known to operate social bots as a means of infiltrating various online discussions and groups, which accounts are then accessed by Akhidat agents to gather data on the human users conversing with the bot’s group.

In 2020, it was claimed by Akhidat defectors that the agency is working closely with Xiaodong’s Shujichu on creating a artificial intelligence based system for digital surveillance and repression.

Akhidat operates a system of detention facilities independent of the wider Hasedar system of prisons operated by the military and state. One such facility is the Kord Mir Detention Centre east of Zahedan, where numerous reports of torture, emotional abuse and starvation have emerged.

Tahleel

Tahleel (تحلیل ; translates as assimilation or corrosion), it is a concept of political warfare supposedly developed during the 1990s as a means of undermining select societies and governments. According to Akhidat defectors, the primary target of Tahleel in its conception and execution is Euclean nations, primarily those of the Euclean Community.

In 2015, Yazeed al-Nasri, an Akhidat agent captured in Estmere in 2004 and was released in exchange for cooperation described Tahleel as a “process of infiltration, predation and then finally corrosion.” The tactic sees “Akhidat prey upon the Coian-Rahelian migrant communities in East Euclea, infiltrating them and turning into useful agents of the agency, usually be praying upon socio-economic divisions.” This according to al-Nasri and others, has enabled Akhidat to establish deep rooted cells or support groups within Euclean countries.

Al-Nasri also explained, “Tahleel is not an immediate action, it takes time, it is designed to take time. The concept of long-term returns is different in Zorasan to the short-term focused nature of Euclea. When a country lays claim to a lineage over 3,000 years old, one can be patient.” It is believed that after a target society is infiltrated and a base is established among key demographics, disruption and the undermining of the target state will begin, utilising social media, the internet, dinsinformation to spark divisions. It is further hoped that agents of Akhidat in these countries will gain positions vital for the collection of corporate, military or political intelligence. A final intention of Tahleel is to establish a "cell of supporting agents and activists who could be called upon to instigate actions against a target state, through criminality, sabotage and disruption."

Notable activities

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Director-Commanders

No	Director-Commander		Tenure
1		General Ershad Chamran	1 January 1980 - 31 October 1984
2		Brigadier General Masoud Borazjani	31 October 1984 - 12 March 1989
3		Brigadier General Shahrdad Rohani	12 March 1989 - 10 July 2001
4		General Ziad al-Bizri	10 July 2001 - 19 September 2008
5		Brigadier General Ghassan Hamid Ali	19 September 2008 - 3 February 2014
6		Major General Ataollah Shamshiri	3 February 2014 - 10 July 2016
8		General Saeed Deghan	10 July 2016 – present