Iran linked to more than 20 plots to kill or kidnap British citizens and residents

In a statement to Parliament on the growing threat to the United Kingdom posed by Iran, a British government minister revealed on Tuesday that since the beginning of 2022, MI5 has responded to 20 plots by the Islamic Republic “presenting potentially lethal threats to British citizens and UK residents.”

The announcement by Dan Jarvis, the government’s security minister, comes as  investigations by MI5 into state threats surged by 48% last year. These investigations are understood to include suspected sabotage cases linked to the Russian intelligence services, espionage by China and attempts by Iran to intimidate and murder dissidents.

The Iranian “regime has become increasingly emboldened, asserting itself more aggressively to advance their objectives and undermine ours. This is evidenced by the fact that direct action against UK targets has substantially increased over recent years,” said Jarvis.

Iran has particularly targeted political critics on a global scale, including “media organisations and journalists reporting on the violent oppression of the regime” as well as Jewish and Israeli people internationally.

Last year, the British government announced sanctions against Naji Sharifi Zindashti, an alleged Iranian drug trafficker with ties to Tehran’s intelligence services who was charged in the United States with recruiting a member of the Hells Angels in a plot to murder an Iranian defector who had previously fled to Maryland.

Zindashti, who remains at large in Iran, operated a network that “carried out numerous acts of transnational repression including assassinations and kidnappings across multiple jurisdictions in an attempt to silence the Iranian regime’s perceived critics,” stated the Treasury at the time.

According to the U.S. Treasury, the Iranian regime “increasingly relies on organized criminal groups in furtherance of these plots in an attempt to obscure links to the Government of Iran and maintain plausible deniability,” citing the kidnapping of Jamshid Sharmahd, the assassination of Ahmad Molla Nissi, and the kidnaping and execution of Ruhollah Zam, among many others.

According to the British sanctions announcement, other individuals also designated include members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Unit 840 who — as uncovered in an investigation by news channel ITV — had offered a criminal $200,000 to assassinate two journalists.

The journalists worked at Iran International, a television station that was perceived to be critical of the regime. The station has since moved to the United States, claiming it was no longer safe to operate on British soil.

That followed a warning by Germany’s domestic intelligence service that Iranian dissident organizations and individuals in the country were being targeted by a suspected state-sponsored threat group.

Jarvis, Britain’s security minister, said Tuesday: “It is clear that these plots are a conscious strategy of the Iranian regime to stifle criticism through intimidation and fear. These threats are unacceptable. They must and will be defended against at every turn.”

He added that “the government is absolutely committed to ensuring that our intelligence and law enforcement agencies have the tools they need to disrupt and degrade the threats that we face from Iran” and as such the whole of the Iranian state would be placed on the “enhanced tier of the new Foreign Influence Registration Scheme.”

The scheme, which is not actually operational yet, will be established “as soon as possible, with a view to having [it] up and running by the summer,” said Jarvis. It means even criminal proxies used by Iran must register their activity “whatever it is” or face 5 years in prison.

In a move initially pledged by the party’s manifesto, Jarvis also announced that Jonathan Hall KC, currently the independent reviewer of state threat and terrorism legislation, will be examining Britain’s approach to counterterrorism to see what could be applied to modern day state threats. It is not clear when this review will be completed.