Profile: Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr, Iran’s new top security official

By Press TV Website Staff

Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr, a veteran military commander with a career spanning decades, was on Tuesday appointed the new Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC).

Seyyed Mehdi Tabatabai, the deputy for communications and information at the Iranian president's office, made the announcement in a post on X, formerly Twitter.

Zolqadr’s appointment was made by President Masoud Pezeshkian with the endorsement of Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Mojtaba Khamenei, the official said.

He replaces Ali Larijani, who was assassinated in an Israeli-American terrorist strike last week. Larijani served in the position from August 2025 until his martyrdom.

The appointment of Zolqadr, a veteran of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) and former security and judicial official, comes as the war imposed on Iran enters the fifth week.

Zolqadr brings decades of experience in security, military, and strategic affairs to the role.

He was born in 1954 in Fars province, and began his political and religious activities as a teenager before the 1979 Islamic Revolution, before joining revolutionary groups to fight the West-backed Pahlavi regime.

After the revolution, he began his career with the Revolutionary Committees before joining the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). During the Iran-Iraq war, he served as the IRGC's training chief and later commanded the Irregular Warfare Headquarters. 

Before the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Zolqadr earned a bachelor's degree in economics from Tehran University, followed by a master's in public administration from the same university.

He later completed a doctorate in strategic management at the National Defense University.

Through a career spanning decades, he held several high-ranking positions, including deputy commander-in-chief of the IRGC and chief of staff of the country’s armed forces.

His background includes service as deputy for Basij affairs at the General Staff of the Armed Forces, as well as senior roles in the interior ministry during the ninth administration, where he served as deputy for security and law enforcement affairs and later as acting minister.

Zolqadr also spent nearly a decade in the judiciary, serving first as deputy for social protection and crime prevention (2010–2012) and later as strategic deputy (2012–2020).

More recently, he served as secretary of the Expediency Discernment Council and headed the election headquarters of the Popular Front of the Islamic Revolutionary Forces.

Zolqadr now takes the helm of the country's highest security decision-making body, at a critical juncture as Iran navigates the war imposed by the US and the Israeli regime.

He is also a prolific writer and author of several books, including ‘The Fall of Israel’.

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