Iranian TV journalist Pouria Zeraati posts replace from hospital after being stabbed exterior London residence as counter-terror police examine | EUROtoday

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An Iranian TV journalistwho was stabbed exterior his London residence in a horror knife assault has posted an image from his hospital mattress as counter-terrorism police had been referred to as in to research.

Pouria Zeraati was described as being in a secure situation after being stabbed within the leg through the incident, which came about in south London on Friday.

Iran International spokesman Adam Baillie stated on Saturday that the incident was “hugely frightening” however that Mr Zeraati was “doing very well” and recovering in hospital. Hours later, he posted an image of himself in hospital, flashing the peace signal.

The London-based dissident channel goals to supply impartial protection of Iran, however the Tehran regime has declared it a terrorist organisation. No arrests have been made to this point.

Iran’s cost d’affaires within the UK Mehdi Hosseini Matin stated “we deny any link” to the incident.

It got here as witnesses claimed Mr Zeraati’s attackers had been “clearly laughing” as they ran from the scene of the stabbing earlier than getting right into a automotive.

A neighbour, who didn’t want to be named, stated he was strolling down the residential avenue with a pal and witnessed the aftermath.

He advised The Standard: “It’s a very quiet suburban road and we saw two young men sprinting towards us, about 20 yards away and then got into a car. They sped off.

“It felt odd. The two men were laughing, quite clearly laughing. I looked two of them in the eye – they were no more than a cricket pitch length away from me.

“We took the number plate and about ten seconds later there’s a man trying to flag us down. We tried to give first aid and take his jeans off.

“He had been stabbed, I think four times. He had his jeans on and he had a pool of blood on his leg. It was [awful] to see.”

Mr Baillie claimed the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) has been concentrating on journalists from the channel and their households.

He advised BBC Radio 4’s Today: “It was a shocking, shocking incident, whatever the outcome of an investigation reveals.

“But for him as a leading presenter, as with our other presenters and journalists, yes, it is a great shock. It’s the first attack of its kind.”

Asked what he believed lay behind the assault, Mr Baillie stated: “We can’t say. The fact that counter-terrorism is leading the investigation probably speaks for itself.

“Along with our colleagues at BBC Persian, Iran International has been under threat, very heavy threats, for the last 18 months since the IRGC said ‘we’re coming for you’, which they have consistently repeated.”

He stated the IRGC “get in touch through proxies, they don’t leave a paper trail”.

“No one’s going to call up from the IRGC and go ‘hey, it’s us’, but families have been taken in for questioning, and threatened.”

He added: “The scale of that has increased dramatically over the last few months. And the scale and the type of questioning is more aggressive, ‘tell your relatives to stop working for this channel’ and so on.”

The Met stated in a press release the motivation for the assault was not but clear. But the pressure added that Mr Zeraati’s occupation, coupled with current threats in the direction of UK-based Iranian journalists, meant the probe was being led by specialist counter-terrorism officers.

Since 2022, quite a lot of plots to both kidnap or kill British or UK-based people perceived as enemies of the Iranian regime have been disrupted by police, it’s understood.

In January, the Foreign Office introduced sanctions in opposition to members of the IRGC’s Unit 840 following an ITV investigation into plots to assassinate two of Iran International’s presenters within the UK.

Officials stated the plot was the newest credible instance of Iran’s makes an attempt to kill or intimidate Britons or folks with hyperlinks to the UK, with at the least 15 such threats since January 2022.

In a separate case in December 2023 an IT employee was jailed for three-and-a-half years for spying on Iran International earlier than a “planned attack” on British soil.

Magomed-Husejn Dovtaev carried out hostile reconnaissance for others unknown on the London headquarters of Persian-language tv channel Iran International in February.

After a trial on the Old Bailey, the Chechnya-born Austrian was discovered responsible of making an attempt to gather data for terrorist functions.

Anyone with data ought to contact police by calling 0800 789 321.