they wanted to attach a bomb into my car. criminal proxies are being used to carry out the abductions and assassinations. we believe these plots come from the organisations which are part of the iranian state's apparatus. i've been following the plots across turkey, britain and north america, and one name keeps coming up again and again. a mafia boss, who court documents reveal has been doing the dirty work for the iranian regime. his name - naji sharifi zindashti.

this is the story of a chilling connection between iranian security forces and international criminal networks. a story of murder for hire. one, one, two, three, four, five, six. sound is ok? for two decades, i've reported conflicts in the middle east, investigating assassinations and corruption tied to the islamic republic of iran. but two years ago, it came right to my doorstep. over the last few years, i and many iranian journalists have been subjected

to online harassment and threats from the iranian security forces. sima sabet is a former host of a talk show on iran international, a farsi tv station that broadcasts into iran. she and her former colleagues were targeted for assassination, first by a car bomb and then a knife attack. but the people-smuggler who was commissioned to do the hit turned double agent. they wanted to attach a bomb into my car. and later, based on the information that they gathered around my home, they realised that, oh, i come with my car out of a secure car park. so he was instructed to go and target me in the corridors, in the lift, or somewhere inside the building, to follow me and just stab me. it was unit 840 of the quds

force, and he was giving the order to a person who was a syrian commander. and he was the one who was a double agent. so that's how i am alive now, because he went to the security services and informed them. western sanctions have targeted iranian security forces, including the islamic revolutionary guard corps that reports to iran's supreme leader... ..its quds force, an elite unit of iran's islamic revolutionary guard corps, responsible for conducting covert operations outside iran's border, and its unit 840, that's responsible, among other things, for planning and establishing terror infrastructure. iran's ministry of intelligence and iranian diplomats have also been sanctioned for their role in murder and abduction plots.

the islamic republic of iran has imprisoned many journalists and restricted their activities simply for doing their jobs. like many others, i left the country and continue to cover iran from here in the uk. but i never thought one day i have to watch my back on the streets of london. this wave of violent plots, orchestrated by the iranian security forces, has raised serious concerns within uk counter-terrorism agencies. the uk domestic security service, mi5, has reported 20 credible plots against iranian nationals in the uk since 2022. we're determined to protect those individuals.

we're determined to protect free and fair broadcasting and journalism from the uk. and we are going after hard those individuals who either think they can project that from places like iran, or they think that they can simply enter into a contract with organised or low-level criminals to do that dirty work for them. but i've been following evidence that shows the plots reach far wider. in 2017, saeed karimian was assassinated on the streets of istanbul. he ran a series of tv channels, gem tv, that aired western movies and series to iran.

in the eyes of islamic regime, the programmes were against islamic values. at the time, i was the bbc correspondent there. well, our correspondent, jiyar gol, joins us now from istanbul. some other people on social media, they say there was a lot of murky businesses. it might be actually some sort of business feud or gang-related issue. but what we know definitely - iranian regime wasn't happy with the kind of programme he was showing. siren wails just two years later, masoud molavi vardanjani, a former member of the iranian revolutionary guards who had defected, was assassinated in istanbul. gunshots

he'd been publishing details of corruption at the highest level in the iranian leadership on his telegram account called black box. an iranian diplomat on his way to tehran was arrested in istanbul airport in connection with the plot, but was later released after he claimed diplomatic immunity. i got hold of this copy of the turkish court document and the investigation around the assassination of saeed karimian in istanbul. there is a suspect name here - naji sharifi zindashti. i've heard that name before. but in connection with drug trafficking, not political assassination. timur soykan is one of turkey's leading investigative

journalists and has exposed crime and corruption at the highest levels.

a year later, zindashti was arrested in connection with the killing. he was held for six months, but was then released. in october 2020, another dissident was targeted. habib chaab was lured from sweden to turkey and abducted. the iranian regime accused chaab of plotting attacks against iranian security forces. he was smuggled back to iran, where a confession was extracted. after a show trial, he was convicted and executed. again, someone related to zindashti was arrested in turkey in connection

with the kidnapping. this time, his nephew. so who is this man, naji sharifi zindashti? he was known to be a notorious drug trafficker in turkey. but is there more to him? turkey is one of the meeting points for drug routes from the east and criminal gangs supplying drugs to europe in the west. zindashti grew up in the border area of iran that has seen drugs trafficked for decades. someone who knows his history and whose identity we are concealing for his own safety,

says in 1996, while he was still a young man, drug running is what brought him to the attention of the authorities in iran. he is portrayed here by an actor. naji was arrested for drug smuggling and sentenced to death. but rumours later surfaced that he killed a prison guard and had escaped from tehran prison. now we finally understand the true reason behind his release. if someone is sentenced to death and kills a prison guard and escapes, there is no doubt that he will be executed by iranian islamic laws. so the only plausible way for him to return and live freely would be if he'd been working for iran's intelligence services.

zindashti, who the us authorities say is an asset of the iranian ministry of intelligence, is the prime suspect in each of the plots against the iranian dissidents in turkey - in 2017 for the murder of saeed karimian, in 2019 for the murder of masoud molavi vardanjani, and in 2020, the abduction of habib chaab. turkey has charged iranian diplomats and people linked to zindashti for their roles in the plots.

if you look at naji's social media, you will see he's a strong supporter of the regime. he's been meeting with tribal leaders, securing their loyalty to the regime. this is all part of iran's intelligence operation.

some breaking news now from 11 news investigates involving a murder for hire plot, a member of the hell's angels and the iranian government. the us department of justice and fbi have indicted several people for plotting to assassinate two maryland residents. a year later, naji zindashti was implicated in yet another plot, this time more than 5,000 miles away, just outside the us capital in maryland.

the feds charged one iranian and two canadian nationals for plotting the murders of two maryland residents, one of whom had defected from iran, according to court documents. it has been few months i've been investigating naji sharifi zindashti's action in turkey, in iran and possibly linked to uk. i have come to washington dc, here the seat of power. i really hope to be able to talk to us officials, current and former officials in intelligence community, just to find out who was the target in maryland. we have seen that the irgc and quds force are a part of iran's efforts to undertake both lethal plots,

plots to kidnap and also to harass dissidents and other perceived opponents. i think there is a growing body of evidence, and some of this evidence is now public, following the january indictment and the sanctions that we imposed on zindashti and his co-conspirators about this plot, and i think what we've seen is, you know, this is one example of the iranian regime's efforts to use transnational plotting to co-ordinate with organised criminal groups in order to target its perceived opponents. in december 2023, this document was filed in the district of minnesota against hell's angels members. what is interesting here, the prosecutor refers to the target as victim number 1, who had defected from iran.

it is very clear whoever this person was must have been a member of iranian establishment. that's why they were so angry, they came after this person. this document also transcribes an online chat on how to kill victim number 1, and zindashti has been communicating with this criminal group. he says it must "be overkill". eventually, they agree on 370,000 usd. and zindashti said, you have to make a show. make an example of him. we've got to erase his "head from his torso". zindashti, who the us authorities say is an asset of the iranian ministry of intelligence, was caught agreeing to pay this money in an online chat. at the sharp end of this assassination plot were two criminals who were

members of the same hell's angels biker gang. we have seen evidence of this kind of coordination between iranian government officials and criminal organisations, whether it's drug traffickers, organisations such as the hell's angels, and i think some of this evidence is now public, as we've seen through the publication of the indictment against zindashti and his network. ten years ago, some us media claimed general ali-reza asgari, a former deputy defence minister of iran, had defected to the united states and was living under cia protection. was he the target in maryland? general asgari was one of the founders of lebanese hezbollah. he held key insights about iran's nuclear activities and hezbollah.

zindashti may have been assigned to kill asgari - someone who the regime believed had betrayed its secrets. the official us position is that we do not know his location, and you should believe that. the israeli intelligence community has told us that he most likely, that asgari was already working with western intelligence agency. i am the one us official that would know everything about this. but the official line is all i'm going to say. in this indictment, the fbi names four members of iranian intelligence service for orchestrating a kidnapping plot in new york. the target was masih alinejad, a female iranian activist.

but none of these individuals have been arrested. so, a couple of years ago, four iranian agents were actually charged in absentia with trying to kidnap you. can you believe that? first of all, they're scared of women. when they came after me here, my job was just giving voice to voiceless women inside iran. first, they sent someone here to kidnap her. and the plot was so crazy that i got multiple phone calls from journalists saying, "this can't be true. this is kooky." because they were gonna grab her here in new york, they were gonna put her on a small boat to a fishing boat, the fishing boat was going to go down to venezuela, they were going to take her in venezuela, put her on an aeroplane to tehran, uh, show trial. and then, one can only assume, kill her. when it was publicly exposed, that did not dissuade them from trying again. and this time, they sent

an azeri shia to the front step of her home. literally to her doorstep. and she happened to have one of those doorbell cameras. and so the guy is with his iphone, taking footage of her front porch, without realising that he's being recorded himself, which is why we have this footage. and he gets arrested right around the corner from her house with an ar-15 and ammunition in his car. that's how brazen the iranians are in terms of the pursuit of these external operations. if it was not the fbi stopping the kidnapping plot, i would have been in iran, now executed. the fbi actually arrested a man with a loaded gun in front of my house in brooklyn. just like in the maryland case,

the hit men carrying out these plots weren't iranian at all. they were hired hands. a notorious international criminal gang from the former soviet union, known as the thieves in law. but the thread leads back to four iranian intelligence officers, five members of the iranian revolutionary guard corps and a member of the elite quds force. you mentioned there have been credible threats. why have we only had one prosecution, we didn't have more prosecution? there are occasions when we can work over a period to gather evidence, to bring about a prosecution, or occasions when the evidence for that prosecution is really there in the hands of people. and in the case of somebody who has the images, you know, we're able to build a case of why those images might have been useful

for terrorist purposes. on other occasions, frankly, we just need to get the person at risk to a place of safety. in january 2024, the uk government sanctioned zindashti, two members of his gang convicted in relation to plots in turkey, two iranian diplomats and unit 840 of the elite quds force of the iranian revolutionary guards. the irgc and iranian intelligence turned a blind eye or permitted him to traffic drugs domestically and internationally. in exchange, he aids them to the targeted abductions and killings of iranian dissidents abroad. i managed to track down a rare interview that zindashti had done with a journalist from iran, who asked him about his involvement in the plots and attacks.

a campaign against iranian dissidents and journalists

is one thing, but an fbi investigation has linked iran to even more high-profile targets. in other news, the fbi says it thwarted a murder for hire plan targeting president-elect donald trump. so the justice department today disclosed criminal charges, revealing that iranian government official directed a contact here in the united states to kill donald trump before the election. general qasem soleimani, the commander of irgc elite quds force, was killed in 2020 on the orders of president trump. the irgc commanders vow to avenge his death. since then, the fbi has foiled suspected irgc attempts to kill president trump and former members of his administration who were involved in the decision. the iranian regime has rejected

the allegations. the iranian government has refuted that officially, and i once again refute that. we don't send people to assassinate people. i think that's a campaign ploy. but donald trump's return to the white house could spell trouble for tehran's leadership. as commander in chief, i have no higher responsibility than to defend our country from threats and invasions, and that is exactly what i am going to do. we will do it at a level that nobody's ever seen before. with these actions, we will begin... over the last two years, intelligence services both in the us and europe say

lethal operations against critics of the regime have accelerated. meanwhile, the alleged kingpin behind many of these plots, naji zindashti, remains a wanted man.

live from london, this is bbc news. war of words: donald trump and elon musk engage in an increasingly bitter feud on social media. in scotland, a narrow win for labour in the hamilton by-election, beating the snp and reform uk. tokyo, we have a problem: contact is lost with an unmanned japanese spacecraft trying to land on the moon. and look, no hands! the bbc is given a ride in one of china's new driverless lorries. so here we are, we are racing down the freeway and i've got to say it's pretty weird because you look over, there's the driver, his hands are off the steering wheel.