Global News reported on Wednesday that the Canadian government awarded over $2 million in contracts, including law enforcement and defense contracts, to Mohammad Reza Ghafouri Fard, an Iranian immigrant linked to the terrorist Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). He is also the son of former Iranian vice president Hassan Ghafouri Fard.
According to the Global News report, which was based on recently declassified documents from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), Mohammad Reza Ghafouri Fard emigrated to Canada in 2013 and went into business under the alias “Sal Ghafouri.” Prior to leaving Iran, he was reportedly involved with developing anti-aircraft missiles and electronic jamming equipment for the Iranian military, including the IRGC.
Ghafouri was also allegedly involved with using front companies in Southeast Asia to acquire banned components for Iranian military projects. He later told investigators he was fully aware the items he procured for Iran were blocked by sanctions, but “he did not care.”
Ghafouri got into Canada using its immigration program for skilled workers, but soon traveled back to Iran for meetings with its Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS). CSIS said Ghafouri provided Iranian intelligence with “details of his employment in Canada,” and the MOIS in turn gave him “detailed instructions and warnings” for evading Canadian police and intelligence services.
MOIS also told Ghafouri not to travel to the United States, because it feared the FBI would immediately flag him due to his sanctions-evading activities.
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The most eye-catching detail of the CSIS dossier was how slow the Canadian government was to take action against Ghafouri. He apparently did not run into any trouble with the Canadian bureaucracy until May 2026, when Canada’s immigration department told him it would refuse his bid for permanent citizenship because he was a “threat to the security of Canada.”
Ghafouri was on the radar screen long before that, having been flagged as a potential national security risk by the immigration department in 2017 — but he was still able to win government contracts for years afterward, including a $1.5 million contract from the Canadian Armed Forces. He reportedly scored another military contract in 2024, a year after CSIS sent a screening report about him to immigration officials. He also landed a contract from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
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Ghafouri has undeniably been industrious during his 13 years of living in Canada, having founded a company called Melanite as a one-man operation focused on government procurement, building it up to a good-sized team of consultants and contractors, and then incorporating a similar company called Radian in 2018. The Global News report did not mention any outstanding complaints against his companies for their business practices.
Ghafouri, on the other hand, has filed a few complaints against the Canadian government, including accusations of “irregularities” in the bidding for contracts his companies did not get and legal action against the immigration department for allegedly mishandling his citizenship application. He has asked for up to $25,000 in damages from the court for the inconveniences caused by his inability to obtain citizenship.
As for his political background, Ghafouri, now 45 years old, has admitted to his past activities on behalf of the Iranian government and IRGC, but claims he has been trying to break from Iran and live as a productive Canadian.
“We have built our family, professional and community endeavors in Edmonton, Canada, and the uncertainty and delays associated with the processing of the citizenship applications and whether we will be able to stay in Canada permanently has placed a big toil on our family,” he wrote in one of his court submissions for his complaint against the immigration department.
The Global News quoted observers who said the case shows Canada does not take national security seriously enough, and its agencies do not communicate with each other effectively.
Professor Thomas Juneau of the University of Ottawa called the case “absurd,” given the amount of troubling information CSIS has amassed on Ghafouri.
Juneau blamed lax screening of immigrants from oppressive countries like Iran for enabling transnational repression, because authoritarian regimes are able to insert plenty of loyalists and enforcers in the free countries to which their citizens flee.
The Jerusalem Post on Thursday anticipated the Ghafouri case could add to the friction between Canada and the United States, given his past work in developing the Iranian weapons that currently threaten American pilots.
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