A petition by the hardline news website Fars has collected over 50,000 signatures for the prosecution of former lawmaker Faezeh Hashemi Rafsanjani for remarks against the IRGC.

Hashemi, who is the daughter of former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and a pro-reform politician, recently said that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) should remain on the United States' list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO), arguing that its removal is not in Iran's interest.

The petition page of the Fars news agency, affiliated to the IRGC, is designed with a maximum target of 50,000 signatures that Fars claims it would be enough to make the case considered for a public discussion in Iran’s parliament. The petition for Hashemi’s persecution has collected nearly 53,000 signatures in one day.

Echoing similar sentiments, conservative politician Hamidreza Taraghi, a senior member of Motalefeh (the Islamic Coalition party), also told the news agency that prosecution of Hashemi is a public demand now and “people are completely dissatisfied with and complain about her repeated stances”.

Taraghi added that when such remarks are not dealt with seriously, Ali Motahari, a former deputy speaker of the parliament, dares to make “nonsensical” comments about the country’s nuclear program “in order to be seen”.

Motahari had said on Sunday that Iran’s aim from the beginning was to produce nuclear weapons as a deterrent force, but it failed to keep the project secret after the Mojahedin Khalq (MEK) opposition group revealed the program to the world.