Alleged Iranian spy wanted £150,000 to 'finish off' UK-based journalist, court hears

An alleged member of an Iranian spy ring operating in the UK wanted £150,000 to "finish off" a journalist, a court has heard.

Mostafa Sepahvand, 41, Farhad Javadi Manesh, 46, and Shapoor Qalehali Khani Noori, 57, are accused of carrying out surveillance and reconnaissance against London-based critics of the Iranian regime.

Woolwich Crown Court heard the defendants visited addresses - taking photos and videos - and carried out online research in what was "very obviously a form of spying" for the Iranian intelligence services between August 2024 and March last year.

Two journalists who worked for London-based Persian language broadcaster Iran International, Mojtaba Pourmohsen and Kambiz Hosseini, were among the alleged targets.

Sepahvand was allegedly planning to carry out a violent attack for money and was promised by his handlers his theft conviction in Iran would also be "fixed".

He was told in one message shown to jurors: "You are expected to hit or kill the journalist."

In a later voice note, in which he complained about how little he had been paid for conducting surveillance, Sepahvand said: "They pay the £150,000, and I'll finish them off."

Prosecutor Bill Emlyn Jones suggested the figure for "finishing the job" would amount to "a very powerful incentive to do as instructed - more than enough, it would seem, to get past any ideological reluctance".

"None of this was particularly high-tech, none of this was very sophisticated," he said.

"But it served a simple purpose - to gather enough information about their targets, so that those targets could be made to suffer the consequences of daring to criticise the Iranian regime."

The prosecutor said "eliminating hostile, critical or dissident actors overseas is a staple policy" of Iran and told jurors the most famous example was the Fatwa against author Salma Rushdie over his novel 1989 novel The Satanic Verses.

Mr Rushdie was stabbed in New York in 2022, losing his sight in one eye, more than 30 years after the Supreme Leader of Iran pronounced he had been sentenced to death, the court heard.

"In this trial we are concerned with steps being taken here in London, on behalf of the Iranian regime, to target journalists and others considered to be hostile to, or just critical of the regime," said the prosecutor.

He said their ultimate aim was to subject their targets to "serious violence - no doubt as retribution for criticism of the Iranian regime, and to try to silence and deter others who might dare to voice their criticism".

The court heard barrister Jonathan Turner, a founder member of UK Lawyers for Israel, was also among the surveillance targets.

All three men deny engaging in conduct likely to assist a foreign intelligence service, under the National Security Act.

Sepahvand, of St John's Wood, north London, also denies engaging in surveillance, reconnaissance and open-source research with the intention to commit serious violence against a person in the UK.

Manesh, of Brent, and Noori, of Ealing, both in west London, deny a further charge of engaging in surveillance and reconnaissance, with the intention that serious violence against a person in the UK would be committed by others.

The court heard there is no dispute they conducted the surveillance and reconnaissance alleged, but Manesh and Noori will claim they didn't know they were assisting the Iranian intelligence services.

Sepahvand is expected to say he was "bullied or threatened" into doing what he did and "deliberately did a bad job" so they would not get the assistance they wanted, the jury was told.

The trial, which is expected to last up to six weeks, continues.

(c) Sky News 2026: Alleged Iranian spy wanted £150,000 to 'finish off' UK-based journalist, court hears