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SIR Keir Starmer has called on Iran to “return to the negotiating table” as he responds to Trump’s blitz.
The Prime Minister urged the Tehran to “reach a diplomatic solution to end this crisis”, in a statement relea…
Maps and satellite images of the sites the U.S. struck on Saturday night.
DONALD Trump has blitzed Iran’s nuclear bases to stop the Ayatollah’s doomsday project in a complex operation from air and sea.
The president has declared the strike a “spectacular success” that “obliterated” the mad mullahs’ atomic program.
Donald Trump in the Situation Room during the strike[/caption]
The B-2A Spirit was used to carry the bunker busting bombs[/caption]
To do that, Trump used some of the US military’s most advanced weapons.
Twelve 30,000lb bunker busting bombs – officially called the GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) – were used to hit the most difficult target, Trump told Fox News.
They were dropped from six B-2 bombers flying high in the atmosphere for 37 hours all the way from Missouri, the New York Times reported.
The lethal bombers even refuelled several times in the air so they didn’t have to land.
B-2 bombers were the only weapon which could do the job – because the Ayatollah’s prized Fordow nuclear enrichment plant is 300ft deep underground and encased in steel.
Israel has been unable to destroy the site by itself – with Trump declaring on Saturday that only America could destroy it from above.
Now, Trump claims he has done so – with twelve bunker busters able to bury deep through the rock and hit the base.
The missiles – 20ft long and carrying a 5,000lb warhead – were dropped by the B-2s, hit the earth, and buried themselves deep into the rock before they exploded.
Iran claims that it knew the attack was coming and evacuated anything of value from the base.
But two other of Iran’s nuclear facilities were also hit – Natanz and Isfahan.
They were blitzed by 30 Tomahawk missiles fired from submarines 400miles away.
Tomahawk missiles are a long-range weapon which can be fired from land or sea and can travel at least 1,000miles.
The US keeps a naval base across the Persian Gulf from Iran in Bahrain.
The complex at Natanz holds Iran’s largest uranium enrichment plant – crucial for getting the material to weapons grade.
A US submarine – capable of carrying up to 154 Tomahawk missiles[/caption]
Isfahan nuclear power plant[/caption]
One B-2 also dropped two bunker busters on Natanz, according to the New York Times.
Isfahan is thought to hold a repository of near bomb-grade nuclear material.
Both Natanz and Isfahan had previously been hit by Israel.
The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Grossi, previously said Iran’s biggest atomic plant at Natanz was knocked out by the first waves of the Israeli offensive.
Mr Grossi said: “The above-ground part of the pilot fuel enrichment plant, where Iran was producing uranium enriched up to 60% U-235, has been destroyed”.
Uranium-235 is essential both for nuclear power stations and also for nuclear weapons.
Trump addressing the nation revealed America had ‘obliterated’ Fordow[/caption]
Posting on Truth Social, President Donald Trump announced that US bombers targeted Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan enrichment sites.
The bombings come just two days after Trump said he would decide “within two weeks” whether to join key ally Israel in attacking Iran.
In a nationally televised speech at the White House, Trump said: “Tonight I can report to the world that the strikes were a spectacular military success. Iran’s key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated.
“Iran, the bully of the Middle East, must now make peace. If they do not, future attacks will be far greater and a lot easier.
“There will be either peace or there will be tragedy for Iran far greater than we have witnessed over the last eight days.”
Arak plant – satellite pictures of this plant near the Iranian town of Arak surfaced over 20 years ago.
It contains a heavy-water reactor with plutonium that can be used for nuclear bombs.
Bushehr nuclear power station – this power plant is a combination of Russian and German engineering.
It’s nuclear reactor is operating at 100% power and the site is home to enriched uranium, used for nuclear bombs.
Gachin uranium mine – home to uranium ore concentrate, or yellowcake, which can be transformed into enriched uranium ready for nuke bomb assembling.
Isfahan conversion plant – yellowcake is converted here into three dangerous substances.
Hexafluoride gase used in the enrichment process, uranium oxide used to fuel reactors and metal used in the cores of nuclear bombs.
Natanz uranium enrichment plant – this is Iran’s largest enrichment base.
It’s made up of three underground buildings and is closely watched by the international community.
Parchin military site – south of Tehran, this site is focused on research and the production of ammo, rockets and explosives.
Concerns have been raised that it is also used as part of Iran’s nuclear weapon development.
Qom uranium enrichment plant – a heavily fortified and initially secret facility where Iran carries out uranium enrichment.
TENSIONS in the Middle East ramped up further yesterday as B-2 stealth bombers left the US for a possible strike on Iran.
US president Donald Trump is believed to have signed off …
Israel on Saturday struck sites in southwestern Iran that would most likely be on any potential flight path used by U.S. warplanes on the way to attack a key Iranian nuclear facility.
ISRAEL will continue blitzing Iran’s nuclear sites with or without the US joining strikes, Benjamin Netanyahu’s ex-adviser says.
It comes as Donald Trump has revealed he has opened a two-week window for talks as he mulls whether America will intervene in the conflict.
Israel has already struck a number of nuclear targets in Iran[/caption]
Damage inflicted on Tel Aviv after a missile[/caption]
Netanyahu will push on with his bombing campaign with or without US help[/caption]
Iran and Israel have been trading missiles for over a week[/caption]
The US president, through White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, said there is “a substantial chance of negotiations…with Iran in the near future“.
Trump had previously tried to curb Tehran’s sprawling nuclear scheme through diplomacy.
He gave Iran’s regime 60 days to thrash out a deal – a deadline that passed two days before Israel unleashed unprecedented strikes on Iran’s nuke sites last Friday.
Trump has this week been weighing whether to give the green light for the US to step in and deploy a 15-ton mega bunker buster bomb.
America’s intervention has repeatedly been touted by Trump, who warned Iran would suffer the “full strength and might” of his military.
But Netanyahu’s ex-adviser Nadav Shtrauchler – who told The Sun the Israeli PM was preparing to strike Iran alone days before he did – said the embattled nation is prepared to carry on without the US.
He said: “Of course Israel can carry on.
“I think it is going swifter here than people thought when they planned it.
“So Israel can proceed and have many targets to go through.”
Strategic adviser Shtrauchler said he believes the conflict will end with an agreement being thrashed out – and said America’s involvement could change the course of the conflict.
US participation would most likely involve strikes against Iran’s underground Fordo uranium enrichment facility, considered to be out of reach to all but America’s bunker-buster bombs.
Shtrauchler added: “It’s a different story with the US, both with the military and the geopolitical side. It’s a big deal and will change things.
“It’s going to end with an agreement if the regime does not fall, but it is too soon to know that.
“So if the US decides against intervening you wil see more from the Israel side and at some point it will end with an agreement.
“It will make an effect and will change the end result.
“But for now we can see that Israel is working very well itself and we can proceed like this – not without the US support but without the US intervening.”
It comes as Israel and Iran continue to trade heavy blows – with no sign of de-escalation in the weeklong battle.
by Katie Davis, Chief Foreign Reporter (Digital)
BRITAIN will never be safe until Iran’s nuclear scheme is wiped out, Israel’s ambassador told The Sun.
Tzipi Hotovely said Israel is facing its “Churchill moment” and doing the UK a “huge service” by wiping out the rogue state’s efforts to create a nuke weapon.
She also rebuked Sir Keir Starmer‘s calls for de-escalation as she insisted Tel Aviv acted at the “last minute” to save their country from “nuclear holocaust”.
The PM – who chaired an emergency Cobra meeting this week – has insisted that the UK wants to de-escalate the situation and resolve it through diplomacy.
But Amb. Hotovely said Iran had its chance for diplomacy during Donald Trump‘s 60-day deadline to thrash out a deal over its nuclear programme.
And she warned the UK would never be safe until Iran loses any chance of developing a nuke.
The diplomat said Israel is facing its “Churchill moment” as Netanyahu finds himself in a similar position as the British wartime leader did in 1940 – drawing the US into a war with its enemy.
Speaking to The Sun at its headquarters in London, she said: “When they’re calling for de-escalation, you need to understand that the only way to de-escalate the situation is by removing the threat.
“As long as Iran will race faster to have its ballistic missile programme that can destroy cities in Israel, if we will let them continue with that, cities in the UK won’t be safe.”
European and Iranian officials met yesterday in Geneva, and Trump has said he will allow two weeks for negotiations before deciding whether to strike the rogue nation.
Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi made a condition for renewed talks a ceasefire, saying: “There is no room for negotiations with the U.S. until Israeli aggression stops.”
Talks later on Friday between Araghchi and officials from the EU ended without a breakthrough after four hours.
No date was set for the next round of talks, aimed at getting Iran back to the negotiating table with the US.
Missiles continued to rain down in Iran and Israel as the talks were held on Friday in a scramble to de-escalate the conflict.
Netanyahu has insisted Israel’s military operation in Iran would continue for as long as it takes to eliminate the “existential threat” of Iran’s nuclear program and arsenal of ballistic missiles.
Trump will decide within two weeks whether to join Israel’s campaign[/caption]
Smoke pours from Iran’s state broadcaster building following an Israeli attack[/caption]
Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is refusing to back down[/caption]
Israel’s top general echoed the warning, saying the Israeli military was ready for a prolonged campaign.
Iran previously agreed to limit its uranium enrichment and allow international inspectors access to its nuclear sites under a 2015 deal.
But after Trump pulled the US unilaterally out of the deal during his first term, Iran began enriching uranium up to 60 per cent a short, technical step away from weapons-grade levels of 90 per cent.
Access was also restricted access to its nuclear facilities.
Netanyahu signed off a plot to bomb Iran’s nuke facilities last week – killing several of its top generals and nuclear scientists, and striking several nuclear facilities.
Iran has retaliated by firing 450 missiles and 1,000 drones at Israel, according to Israeli army estimates.
Most have been shot down by Israel’s multitiered air defenses, but at least 24 people in Israel have been killed and hundreds wounded.
GROWING up in the most nuked place on Earth, Maira Abenova has helplessly watched as cancer spread through her family.
After years of living near the Semipalatinsk Test Site, she told The Sun how the devastating impact of the radiation “did not spare any family“.
The Semipalatinsk Test Site is the most nuked place on earth[/caption]
The Semipalatinsk region in eastern Kazakhstan was a nuclear test site for the Soviet Union[/caption]
The Cold War relic sits near the border with modern day Russia[/caption]
Lake Shagan, also called the ‘Atomic Lake’, highlighted, is an offshoot of the Shagan River[/caption]
Known as the Polygon, the 7,000 square mile nuclear testing site in north east Kazakhstan was nuked by hellish bombs from 1949 to 1989.
Having been hit by a quarter of all nuclear explosions in history, Semipalatinsk Test Site was an atomic playground for Soviet scientists which was kept secret for decades.
Its infamous “Atomic Lake” was blasted into existence 60 years ago by a bomb ten times more powerful than the one dropped on Hiroshima.
And one of the site’s most destructive detonations reportedly caused four times as many instances of severe radiation poisoning as the Chernobyl disaster.
Following 40 years of nuclear explosions which wreaked havoc on nearby communities, the consequences are still felt today.
Kazakh authorities dished out eerie “radiation passports” to help and identify victims of the fallout – but these have failed to fully cover the tragic repercussions.
Local resident Maira Abenova told The Sun: “After more than 30 years have passed, we can now say that for 40 years, an atomic war was waged on our beautiful land.”
Now a mum and grandma, Maira was raised in the neighbouring high-risk town of Semipalatinsk, which is by the Russian border and is today known as Semey.
She is also the founder an advocacy group for victims of the tests called Committee Polygon 21.
Maira detailed the tragic consequences of Semipalatinsk Test Site which have scarred her own life.
“In 1971, before turning 60, my mother died of esophageal cancer,” she said.
“At that time, we could not know the cause of this disease.”
After losing her mum, her sister passed away in 2013, nearly 25 years after the last recorded nuclear test.
“In 2013, literally a month after surgery, my older sister passed away from breast cancer,” Maira explained.
Her husband was the next loved one to die as a result of the radioactive fallout.
She said: “My husband was diagnosed with stomach cancer – he lived in agony for only a year and a half before he passed away.”
Maira continued: “Just a few months after my husband’s funeral, my brother was diagnosed with lung cancer.
“He survived only three months.”
The devastating consequences of Semipalatinsk Test Site then caught up with Maira herself.
“Last autumn, I was diagnosed with the same disease,” she said.
“I had an operation, but I don’t know how much time I have left.
“Our medical system offers little hope – not because we lack good doctors, but because the healthcare system, especially in our region, is in a deeply deplorable state.”
Image of the Chagan nuclear test, which created the ‘Atomic Lake’ on January 15, 1965[/caption]
It features a notorious ‘Atomic Lake’[/caption]
She added: “The worst thing is when doctors diagnose cancer. It’s like a death sentence.
“A sentence of a painful death. Without proper help and treatment.”
Maira also noted that her local cancer clinic was “always overcrowded”.
Kazakhstan authorities estimate 1.5 million people have been exposed to the test site’s residual fallout.
Nearby populations suffered elevated rates of cancer, heart disease and infertility which were all linked to the tests.
More babies were born with defects, missing limbs, Down syndrome and other disabilities – while the number of suicide rates among young people also rose.
A local city hall official even made the shocking claim that “people in the villages got used to suicides”, according to a UN report.
And grandma-of-two Maira confirmed this epidemic, saying that after the closure of the site, the higher rates of suicide were known as “Kainarsky syndrome”.
Despite the first ever bomb going off on August 29, 1949, four years after the end of World War II, radiation levels are still elevated, and children continue to be born with genetic mutations.
Maira said: “This evil did not spare any family.”
Reflecting on these haunting health impacts, she described the aspect that continues to trouble her most.
“As for the photos showing the aftermath of the tests, I’d say the most frightening consequences aren’t the physical deformities or developmental anomalies,” she said.
“But rather the lingering fear — the fear of dying from an illness that might not be visible on the outside.
“The fear of a young woman giving birth to a child with disabilities, and so on.”
A total of 456 nuclear tests were conducted at the site[/caption]
Statue of Igor Kurchatov, the ‘father’ of the Soviet nuclear program, in the city he was named after[/caption]
The campaigner also detailed a closed-off town called Kurchatov which was built as the headquarters for the testing site and was only accessible with an official pass.
Codenamed Semipalatinsk 21, the base was full of nuclear scientists and military officers, and located on the picturesque bank of the Irtysh River.
The top-secret town had 50,000 or so inhabitants who were all supplied with high quality produce sent straight from the capital.
Meanwhile, locals outside the town lived in relative squalor with “empty store shelves”, Maira explained.
“It was built in a short time,” she said of the city, which has been dubbed the Soviet version of Los Alamos.
“Since the city was built by the military, it resembles a military town – strict lines and no frills.”
The activist added that scientists timed each blast to match the wind direction – making sure the deadly fallout always blew away from their own HQ.
And typical Soviet cover-ups meant that even the locals were unaware of the nearby tests for years.
“We didn’t know about it until the late 1980s, when information about the terrible tests conducted near us began to leak out to the public,” she recalled.
by Harvey Geh
Semipalatinsk Test Site, also known as the Polygon, played a central role in the Soviet Union’s push to win the nuclear arms race during the Cold War.
On August 29, 1949, the USSR detonated its first-ever atomic bomb at Semipalatinsk, just four years after the U.S. bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
That explosion – codenamed RDS-1 or “First Lightning” – ended America’s nuclear monopoly and officially launched the Cold War arms race.
It was a near-copy of the US-made “Fat Man” plutonium bomb, which America dropped on Nagasaki, Japan in August 1945.
Following the landmark explosion, Semipalatinsk became the main site for testing each nuclear development the Soviet Union made, including hydrogen bombs and experimental warheads.
This allowed the USSR to gain data on blast yields and radiation fallout.
From its inception in 1949 to its closure in 1989 with the fall of the Berlin Wall, 116 bombs were detonated in the atmosphere, while 240 exploded underground.
A law created in 1992 meant victims could apply for a “radiation passport”, which confirmed their exposure to the fallout and qualified them for certain benefits.
Each person who had their application approved was given a little beige book with a big blue mushroom cloud on its front cover.
Those holding their own document could then receive things like monthly compensation cash and longer holidays.
This system was said to have worked in its initial phases.
But these days, the scheme is ineffective, according to Maira.
She is now part of a renewed push to improve compensation and bring real justice to the lives of many who have been impacted.
Maira said: “The law that was passed in 1992 is effectively defunct today, and its current provisions are discriminatory.”
Observation tower ruins at the former Semipalatinsk nuclear test site in Kazakhstan[/caption]
The nuclear scientists were based in Kurchatov, named after renowned Soviet nuclear physicist Igor Kurchatov[/caption]
The passport grants holders £30 per month in benefits – barely enough to cover current medical costs – and those who move to live in a different region are disqualified from getting the money.
Many locals have reportedly found it challenging to get official recognition for their children to also obtain the document.
Emphasising the importance of petitioning for better support, Maira explained: “The hardest thing for us is that we feel doomed and unprotected.”
Maira also heads the human rights organisation DOM, which has also played an important role forming initiatives aimed at protecting the rights of victims of nuclear tests.
She says on social media that for the last three years, the organisation has been working “to shape new ways of addressing victims, to achieve significant change, and to expand dialogue with the state and the international community.”
Maira has won awards for her work supporting victims of the tests and participated in UN meetings calling for the ban of nuclear weapons.
She left Committee Polygon 21 earlier this month but continues to work with victims of nuclear fallout through her leading role at DOM.
It is believed that more than one million people resided in and around Semipalatinsk – but today, only a few thousand people remain.
The International Day against Nuclear Tests occurs every year on August 29, the day the first bomb went off in Semipalatinsk Test Site.
Despite neighbouring locals living through the nuclear fallout of the site, it remains unclear exactly how dangerous living in the region is today.
Scavengers have excavated the site in hopes of selling off scrap metal, while locals are known to use the “Atomic Lake” as a fishing spot.
Maira said she was aware locals like to go fishing there as they “have come to believe that it is safe”.
But since the landscape has been marred by nearly half a century of nuclear bombing, she said the area had partly lost its beauty.
“It is more reminiscent of the surface of the moon,” she said.
“A steppe and granite hills that have crumbled over time… scattered across by the atomic explosions.”
VLADIMIR Putin cemented his territorial ambitions by proclaiming “all of Ukraine” belonged to Russia and threatening to seize a key city.
Ukraine slammed the tyrant…
A VULNERABLE Iran may activate a network of sleeper cells across the West in the face of the Israeli bombing campaign, experts have warned.
With its military and top Islamist leadership on the ropes, a weakened Tehran is expected to resort to asymmetric terror warfare in a bid to destabilise its adversaries.
Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei[/caption]
Damage in Israel from an Iranian missile[/caption]
It has now been more than a week since Israel began pounding Iran’s nuclear facilities and other military targets.
The goal, as the Israelis say, is to thwart the Iranian regime’s efforts to produce nuclear weapons – as well as more ballistic missiles, including long-range weapons that can strike targets far beyond Israel.
While Iran has been responding by launching frequent salvos of ballistic missiles, its top military command has been decapitated.
And Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has been forced to live in underground bunkers.
Experts now fear that a vicious Iran could awaken its network of sleeper cells to carry out terror plots across the West.
Barak Seener, a security and defence expert at Henry Jackson Society and Iran expert, said: “The very fact now that the Iranian regime is volatile, it’s targeted, and it’s highly vulnerable — that’s what actually makes it increasingly dangerous to the West.”
Iran’s murderous Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is thought to run an extensive network of sleeper cells across the world.
Mr Seener told The Sun that these sleeper cells could be regular people living regular lives.
But when given the signal, they could carry out terrorist activities targeting the West.
These terror operations could target public infrastructure and even civilians, with no weapons off the table, experts warn.
Mr Seener told The Sun: “They live amongst us in regular communities, have regular jobs, and they just are awaiting being activated to conduct malign activities, whether it be through a telephone text or a beeper, and then they already know what they are going to be doing.
“If the regime feels threatened and on the verge of being toppled, then they may say, ‘you’re going to go down with us,’ and at that point they may unleash their sleeper cells.”
And fears are these sleeper cells may even carry out assassination attempts on top leaders that could throw the world into chaos.
Last year, an Iranian agent was charged with plotting to kill Donald Trump in an assassination that would have shaken the world.
US prosecutors say the rogue state told ex-con Farhad Shakeri — said to be hiding in Tehran — to devise a seven-day plan to spy on and murder him.
Prosecutors said an official in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard told Shakeri to devise a plan to eliminate the President elect.
Iranian worshippers shout anti-US and anti-Israeli slogans[/caption]
Iranian nuclear scientists and IRGC commanders killed by Israel[/caption]
They claim the planned hit was an attempt to take vengeance for a US drone strike ordered by Trump that killed Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, then said to be the world’s No1 terrorist, in 2020.
Trump’s former security advisor, John Bolton, said the US President is “at the top” of an “assassination list” from the Middle East nation.
He said in an interview: “Iran’s terror network is really quite extensive in Europe and in the United States.”
In an op-ed for The Sun, expert Mark Almond wrote: “Iran’s Islamic regime is a dangerous, wounded predator.
“It cannot defeat Israel, but it could go mad and unleash terrorism, even using chemical weapons, which its industries can make much more easily than nuclear weapons.”
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian (R) and Commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Aerospace Force Amir Ali Hajizadeh (C)[/caption]
Mr Seener said the attacks could range from an attack against a synagogue, an embassy, or blowing up a dirty bomb in Central London.
Sir Ken McCallum, the head of MI5, warned back in October that Iran could turn on UK targets if it felt Britain was too enthusiastic in its support for Israel.
He said the attacks could increase if the Middle East conflict intensifies.
In August, Matt Jukes, the head of Counter Terror Policing, warned that Britain is facing an increase in plots by hostile states.
He said Iranian dissidents and diaspora communities have been “clearly at risk of kidnapping or assassination”.
“These are people who are doing it daily. And when you are projecting soft power, you’re creating the cultural milieu in which terrorism can be conducted much more readily.
Counterterror police have investigated 15 of these cases alongside MI5.
MI5 has responded to 20 plots backed by Iran since 2022, it was reported.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei awards a medal to IRGC Aerospace Force Commander Amir Ali Hajizadeh[/caption]
Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) soldiers march in formation[/caption]
Mr Seener said: “The reason why the Irgc can act with impunity, and why British citizens are at risk, is because of the British Government’s unwillingness and failure to designate the Irgc as a terrorist organisation.
“It means that they are able to conduct activities and infiltrate mosques, charities, community centres, cultural centres, and many of them, their directorship has been directly appointed by the supreme leader, Khamenei.”
“British Shias go on pilgrimages to religious sites in Iran and Iraq. They are targeted by the IRGC and recruited, so that when they return to the UK, they can conduct surveillance on potential targets.”
The IRGC is the principal supporter of Hamas and Hezbollah, both of which are proscribed in the UK.
Amid threats of all-out war in the Middle East, officials last year wanted to expedite tightening domestic terror laws to ban IRGC operatives from nurturing Islamist terrorism at home.
Current sanctions on Iran do not prevent state-linked organisations spreading jihadi propaganda or carrying out soft-power activities designed to radicalize British citizens.
Kasra Aarabi, Director of IRGC Research at United Against Nuclear Iran, said: “The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is the most antisemitic armed Islamist extremist organisation in the world.
“The government needs to proscribe the IRGC as a matter of urgency.
“The failure to proscribe the IRGC is putting British lives at risk, not least those from the British-Jewish community and British-Iranian diaspora —the two primary targets of IRGC terrorism in the UK.”
By Sayan Bose, Foreign News Reporter
Iran-fuelled hit squads on the streets of the UK have been linked to at least 15 threats to kill or kidnap detected by authorities.
They are all part of a campaign of intimidation aimed at those who speak out against the hardline regime.
The MI5 has accused Tehran of more than a dozen assassination and kidnap plots in Britain against dissidents and media organisations in the past two years.
Officials have previously warned that the threat against Iranian critics living in the UK has ramped up drastically after the horror October 7 attacks.
And given the hostile situation in the Middle East, Iran could ramp up its secret terror activities in the UK, Europe and the US, experts fear.
In 2022, Major Gen Hossein Salami, the Commander-in-Chief of the IRGC warned: “You’ve tried us before. Watch out because we’re coming for you.”
Last year, Iranian TV journalist Pouria Zeraati was stabbed outside his home in London, sparking an investigation led by counter-terrorism police.
The suspects were believed to be proxy agents hired by Tehran.
Mr Zeraati works for Iran International, a London-based Persian-speaking channel which has reported on Iran’s human rights violations.
He said a man approached him and asked for £3 before another man appeared and stabbed him in the leg.
The two fled in a car being driven by a third man, leaving Mr Zeraati bleeding in the street.
Investigators believed the three culprits were able to flee the country on a flight from Heathrow within hours of the attack.
Mr Zeraati, whose organisation has been a vocal critic of Iran, said the attack was a “warning shot” from Tehran.
He called on the UK government to declare the IRGC a terrorist group to stop it from spreading its doctrine.
He said: “It will also send a clear message to the regime in Iran that enough is enough.
“The whole of Western civilisation is in danger because of the threat the IRGC poses.”
A report by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) found almost half of journalists who covered Iran from the UK reported being physically or verbally harassed in the past five years.
Individuals have been sent death threats by text and voice notes, with one message noting that the “water underneath Westminster Bridge was very deep”.
One said they were constantly worried about Iran targeting their children, saying: “I wake up in the middle of the night. I check my son to see if he’s there. I won’t let him play in the garden on his own. I have to be there. I’m on alert constantly.”
Another reporter told the RSF she had a package, which was designed to look like it contained anthrax, hand-delivered to her apartment block.
While female TV journalist was approached on a London bus by a man who told her: “We will kill you. You are a very bad person.”
All of them are understood to have voiced their dissent against Tehran.
CHINA has slammed the UK after a Royal Navy warship cruised through the Taiwan Strait in a defiant message to Xi Jinping.
Beijing blasted HMS Spey’s patrol through the passa…