Iran is hiring Hells Angels to abduct and kill exiled critics in the US and Europe, report finds
12 September 2024, 20:23
Iran has been hiring Hells Angels and other criminal groups in western countries to target their exiled dissidents, according to reports.
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The Washington Post claims Tehran has recruited gangs to abduct and assassinate its critics in nations including the US, Germany and the UK.
Among those reportedly recruited by Iran is the Russian group 'Thieves in Law’, which is a heroin distribution network run by an Iranian drug trafficker, as well as violent groups from Scandinavia to South America.
A journalist in London, a former Iranian military officer in Maryland and an Iranian-American journalist in Brooklyn are some of the exiles targeted by the Iranian regime.
Iranian journalist Pouria Zeraati, a British citizen, was stabbed four times outside his home on March 29 in Wimbledon, London after years of threats and intimidation that led him to relocate to safe houses for a while.
The Metropolitan Police believes that Tehran hired criminals from Eastern Europe to carry out the attack with detectives saying criminals tracked Zeraati for days before fleeing on a flight just hours later.
Officials reportedly believe the attackers, who have not been caught, may have wanted Zeraati to survive the stabbing in order to scare him but avoid an international scandal.
MI5 and the Metropolitan Police have tracked over 16 plots from the Islamic Republic in the last two years, The Post reported.
It found there have been 88 assassination, abduction and other violent plots linked to Iran over the past five years with at least 14 of them involving criminal groups.
In the US, the Justice Department filed charges last month against a Pakistani man with ties to Iran who was allegedly looking to hire a hitman to kill politicians, possibly including former president Donald Trump.
America-Iranian journalist Masih Alinejad has been the target of at least three plots with officials previously foiling one that involved Thieves in Law member Khalid Mehdiyev turning up on her doorstep.
“There are a lot of people in Eastern Europe and other places and it’s very easy for them to get a visa and come here to do the job,” she told The Post.
German officials say Tehran recruited a fugitive Hells Angels boss, Ramin Yektaparast, to organise and carry out terror attacks against synagogues.
Amid the war in Gaza, Tehran has also been connected to plots against US and Israeli officials in France and Germany.
Iran denied the claims when reached by The Post.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran harbours neither the intent nor the plan to engage in assassination or abduction operations, whether in the West or any other country,” Tehran's mission to the United Nations said in a statement.
“These fabrications are concoctions of the Zionist regime, the Albania-based Mujahedin-e Khalq terrorist cult, and certain Western intelligence services—including those of the United States—to divert attention from the atrocities committed by the Israeli regime.”
