By Sam Tobin
LONDON, Nov 12 (Reuters) – Two Iranian men were found guilty on Thursday of spying on dissident journalists in Britain on behalf of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, a case British police said reflected increasing hostile activity by Iran.
Mostafa Sepahvand, 41, and Farhad Javadi Manesh, 46, were convicted of surveilling journalists who worked for Iran International, a Persian-language television station critical of Iran’s government, between August 2024 and March 2025.
Sepahvand was also convicted of planning a violent attack on one or more of their targets.
Police said the convictions marked the first time Iranian nationals had been convicted under the law introduced in 2023 to counter threats from foreign states including Iran, which the authorities say have risen sharply.
Sepahvand was directed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps or “middlemen” for Iranian intelligence, Senior National Coordinator for Counter Terrorism Policing Vicki Evans said.
Britain has accused Iran of being behind a suspected plot in September targeting RAF Fairford, an airbase used by the US for strikes on Iran, after which US President Donald Trump withdrew American B-1 bombers.
Three men were indicted in the United States over the plot this week, with two other men facing charges in Britain.
The head of domestic spy agency MI5, Ken McCallum, said last month Iran-linked operations had led to more than 50 arrests in the last year and state threats had quadrupled in the last decade. Evans said she expected that trend to continue.
Iran has repeatedly denied involvement in spying or any such activity, and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said he was “disturbed” by the arrests of Sepahvand and others in May 2025.
Iran’s embassy in London did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday’s convictions.
UK SAYS STATE THREATS INCREASING
British police and intelligence services say Iran and Russia are increasingly using hybrid warfare tactics, turning to criminal proxies who are recruited online and motivated more by money than ideology to carry out crimes.
Sepahvand said he was offered up to £150,000 ($198,855) to carry out a violent attack on at least one of their targets, which included two Iran International journalists and the chief executive of UK Lawyers for Israel.
Sepahvand said he acted under duress, but was convicted of assisting a foreign intelligence service and planning to carry out an attack.
Manesh was convicted of assisting a foreign intelligence service, but acquitted of the second charge relating to preparing for an attack. They will be sentenced next month.
A third man, Shapoor Qalehali Khani Noori, 57, was acquitted of both charges.
The trial was the fourth case in Britain relating to Iran International since late 2023, with two Romanian men jailed in July for stabbing a journalist outside his home in 2024.
A spokesperson for Iran International’s parent company Volant Media said in a statement that Thursday’s verdicts “don’t make the lives of our journalists any safer so long as the Islamic Republic of Iran continues its campaign of death threats and violence against them.”
($1 = 0.7543 pounds)
(Additional reporting by Yoruk Bahceli, Editing by Sam Tabahriti, Michael Holden and Timothy Heritage)
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