Iran who uses criminal gangs for strikes abroad shows court documents

The Iranian regime has a sharp growth of plots for abduction or attempted dissidents, journalists and political enemies living abroad, according to the reports of Western special services.

These attempts have grown dramatically since 2022 With even US President Donald Trump among expressed objective. In the UK, Police ask a number of Iranians Arrested earlier this month on suspicion of planning terrorist attacks. The BBC realizes that the alleged goal became the Israel Embassy in London.

Both court documents from Turkey and the USA – BBC Eye Research and BBC Persian – have provided evidence that Iran is hiring criminal gangs for foreign land killings, and previously denied charges. Iranian officials did not respond to a new comment request.

One of the names has repeatedly emerged in these documents: Naji Sharif Zindashti, an Iranian criminal chief known for international drug smuggling.

His name appeared in Turkish charges on killing 2017 in Istanbul Said Karimyan, head of the Persian television network that broadcast Western films and programs in Iran.

Iranian authorities believed that the Carima threats to Islamic values ​​and three months before the murder of the Islamic Revolutionary Court in Tehran sentenced him to correspondence factories up to six years in prison.

The United States and Turkish officials believed that his death was associated with a mafia hostility.

But when Masud Malovi, a perestroika from the Islamic Corporation of the Islamic Revolution (IRGC), was lifted in Istanbul, he shed light on the alleged role of Zindashi in Karimian’s murder.

Malawi exposed corruption at the highest level of Iran’s leadership. Turkish police found that Zindashti’s gardener attended the murder of Malavi, and that his driver was in Kariman’s murder.

Police suspected that the gardener and the driver was sent to Zindashti.

Zindashti was arrested in connection with the death of Karimyan, but was controversially released only six months later, which caused a legal scandal in Turkey. The judge of the Supreme Court ordered him redirected, but still left the country.

He then fled to Iran, lifting his suspicion that he could work for Iranian intelligence.

Chengiz Erdinka, a Turkish journalist -investigation, claims that when those who did not fall with the Iranian regime were killed, Zindashti people are at the scene. “This is not the first time, but there has always been a connection between organized crime and special services,” he says.

For three decades ago, he was convicted of drug smuggling in Iran and sentenced. But the rumors suggested that his escape from prison, which led him to Turkey, was organized by Iranian intelligence.

“If someone is sentenced to death in Iran, after the assassination of the guard, they are unlikely to do it alive – if there is no more story,” says a man who knew Zindashti carefully. BBC contains its own personality for your own safety.

“It would be the only plausible way to return and live freely if it worked in Iran’s intelligence services, and its escape is part of the planned cover history for reconnaissance work with Iran and IRGC,” they said BBC World Service.

In 2020, the Zindashti name again appeared in the Turkish accusation due to the abduction of Habib Chaaba, Iranian dissident, who was attracted to Istanbul, stolen and later pleased on Iran.

The teas was sentenced to death and shot. Zindashti’s nephew was arrested in Turkey in connection with the disappearance of the teas. Zindashti denied any role.

Then, in 2021, Zindashti was involved in the story in the USA. According to the documents of the Minnesota court, the communication between Zindashti and the member of the Canadian Biker bandit “Hells Angels” were concluded.

Zindashti allegedly offered $ 370,000 to kill two Iranian defectors in Merilend. The FBI intervened and arrested two men before the attack could be carried out.

Our investigation of court documents also revealed that IRGC and its foreign operations, the QuDS force, are working with criminal organizations such as thieves, a notorious international criminal gang from the former Soviet Union, for abductions and murders.

US and Israel exploration sources note that the main responsibility of the IRGC force is the planning and creation of terror infrastructure abroad.

In March, a New York jury condemned two men related to the thief for the plan for the murder of the Iran-American activist Massikh Acnejad. Iranian agents allegedly offered $ 500,000 for its murder. Just two years earlier, a man with a loaded pistol was arrested near her home in Brooklyn.

After the attempted 2020, the United States from the chief IRGC commander, General Casem Saleimani Iran, promised revenge. Since then, the United States has claimed that Iran has intended to kill former Trump administration members involved in the death of Saleimani, including former national security adviser John Bolton and Mike Pumpea, a former CIA head and Secretary of State.

During the last year, the US presidential election accused Iran of securing Donald Trump, which Iran strongly denied.

In response to these growing threats, the US and the UK imposed sanctions on persons related to Iran’s intelligence operations, including Zindashti, Iranian diplomats and IRGC members.

Zindashti denies if you work in Iranian intelligence service.

In 2024, Ken McCallum, MI5 director, reported 20 reliable threats against persons in the UK associated with Iran.

In one case, a Chechen man was arrested near Iran International, Persian TV channel in London in West London. He was convicted of collecting information for Iranian agents.

Last year, Puri Zerati, London presenter Iran International, was attacked by a knife. Soon, two men were arrested in Romania at the request of the UK police.

UK security sources reported the BBC that these people were part of the thieves who allegedly hired Iranian agents.

Sima Cex, a presenter of Iran International, was one of the targets, but the attempt to blow her car failed.

“When they realized they couldn’t attach a bomb to my car, the agents told the man quietly finish the job,” says Sim, who saw a police file. “He asked how calm and they replied,” quiet as a kitchen knife. “

Following the murder of four Iranian Kurdish leaders in militants in a restaurant in Berlin in 1992, the German prosecutor’s office accused all Iranian murder leadership. The attack was carried out by Iranian agents and members of the Lebanese Shiite movement supported by Iran.

Iran’s intelligence minister was issued an international arrest warrant, and the court said the murder was ordered with a knowledge of the supreme leader and the President of Iran.

Since then, the Iranian regime seems to hire criminal organizations for abductions and murders in an effort to avoid lining the attacks back to the regime.

But Matt Yux, the head of the UK on law enforcement, says the police are relatively easy to penetrate into criminal groups because they are not ideologically agreed with the Iranian regime.

This is what he calls Iran a “creeping penetration” that the police are trying to disrupt.