Iran 'is Britain's biggest security threat'

The Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards are struggling to infiltrate the UK after the Salisbury poisoning. Credit: Sepahnews

Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps is Britain's biggest threat to national security, says Suella Braverman.

The Home Secretary is concerned by intelligence reports that Iranian spies are trying to recruit members of organized crime groups to against opponents of the regime and are looking to step up their activities in the UK.

Last year, MI5 warned that Tehran was behind ten murders and kidnappings, and in February of this year, the Metropolitan Police said that their number had increased to 15 .

Last month, Graham Biggar, head of the National Crime Agency, warned that hostile states such as Iran were using organized crime gangs to carry out illegal activities in the UK.

This is thought to be because that it has become more difficult for them to bring their operatives into the country after the poisoning in Salisbury in 2018. The UK suspects two Russian military intelligence officers of using a nerve agent in an attempt to kill double agent Sergei Skripal.

The Revolutionary Guard uses speedboats during exercises in the Persian Gulf Photo: Sepahnews

A source close to the Interior Minister is quoted The Sunday Times writes: «We are most concerned about the Iranian threat.»

«This is a big a problem because they become much more aggressive and their appetite increases. They are very protective of anyone who challenges their regime and just want to eradicate it. They step up their agitation.”

Dissident TV channel Iran International was forced to stop broadcasting from its British headquarters after Scotland Yard warned it could not protect staff.

Home Office. ministers led by Security Minister Tom Tugendhat are pushing for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards to be declared a terrorist organization. >Commander-in-Chief of the Guard Hossein Salami addressing troops during maneuvers. Photo: AFP

However, the Foreign Office, headed by James Cleverley, resisted this due to fear that it might cause irreparable damage to diplomatic relations. .

Mr Biggar highlighted «emerging links between serious and organized crime and hostile states» in his speech at the UK Crime Threats Agency's annual assessment.

He suggested that this was not So. only Iran, but also North Korea and Russia. “North Korea has been using cybercrime for some time to steal funds, and more recently cryptocurrencies,” he said. and connections with their oligarchs and their collaborators.

“And over the past year, we have seen how hostile states began to use organized crime groups — not always of the same nationality — as proxies. We and our colleagues from MI5 and the counterterrorism service are closely following developments.”