Make UK a ‘Khamenei-Free Zone’! Campaign launches outside Parliament with support from Robert Jenrick

Robert Jenrick, Lord Walney, Suella Braverman and Richard Tice supported calls for the UK to become a “Khamenei free zone” on Tuesday.

Launching a new campaign, United Against Nuclear Iran (Uani), a policy group which combats the threats posed by the Islamic Republic, asked the government to shut down Ayatollah Khamenei’s British network, close his London base and other extremist hubs and expel regime representatives from the country.

In October last year, MI5 confirmed that it had foiled at least 20 Khamenei regime-backed terror plots in the UK since 2022.

Uani has also called on the government to crack down on support for the Iranian regime’s overseas paramilitary group, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said she supported banning the IRGC before assuming office.

Director of IRGC research at Uani, Kasra Arabi, said: “For far too long, Britain and the EU have failed to take action against the network of infiltration centres tired to the Ayatollah’s regime.

“These centres have been seeking to nurture home grown Islamist radicalisation and propagating extreme antisemitism and even seeking to recruit British nations for nefarious terrorist related activities.

“Our campaign says enough is enough we need to dismantle this network or centres and make Britain and Europe and Khamenei free zone. It is critical for British security because the regime is plotting terror on British street.”

JC investigations have previously revealed a web of Tehran-backed extremism extending across several London-based charities which propagate Islamist radicalisation and antisemitism to children and students and have hosted senior IRGC commanders.

One Islamic charity linked to Iran shared footage of "death to Israel" chants to UK students, while another London school filmed children singing a song that references an apocalyptic myth about massacring Jews.

The Uani campaign, which was launched outside Parliament, has been welcomed by Jewish groups, with the Board of Deputies stating that Khamenei’s network “plays a leading role in fostering extremism and antisemitism, posing a direct threat to the Jewish community, the Iranian diaspora, and all British citizens.”

"We call on the government to scrutinise and, where appropriate, shut down such centres and expel representatives of the Iranian regime. We also urge the Government to move forward with the full proscription of the IRGC, which poses a direct threat to many British citizens both here and abroad,” the Board said.

Shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick accused the Ayatollah of “nurturing Islamist radicalisation [in the UK], spreading antisemitism and even trying to recruit British nationals.”

He said the UK already has the legal framework to dismantle Khamenei’s network and urged the Labour government to use these powers—such as the 2023 National Security Bill—to limit Khamenei’s influence in the UK.

“In the past, I have called for people who are here on visas to be expelled from the country where their activities are not conducive to the public good, that could be antisemitism or the spread of Islamist radicalisation,” he said.

“I am urging the government to take action, to close down centres that propagate this material, to expel where possible those representatives who are leading this activity in the UK and to ensure that the UK is not a hub for the spread of Islamist radicalisation or antisemitism.”

Lord Walney, the Government's independent adviser on political violence and disruption and a former Labour MP, said that Iran was working “very actively to propagate its agenda and undermine the UK” and called on the government to combat Iran-backed antisemitism.

“I want to see the Labour government across all departments focus on the pernicious antisemitism which has been injected into our education system and our charity sector very deliberately by Iran,” he said.

While he suggested that Labour ministers were “committed” to combatting antisemitism, he added that the government needed more joined up thinking. “The important thing is to ensure all parts of the system understand what they are looking for and can shut it down.”

Government must “avoid working in silos,” and the Uani campaign must be understood across “departments, universities and within schools themselves,” he added, vowing to speak to Labour ministers about the campaign. Departments needed a “signal from the top that they will be backed in taking the firm action that is needed,” he said.

Tom Tugendhat MP said: “We know that the Khamenei regime is particularly targeting Jews. They claim that this is an anti-Israeli thing, but we know that that is complete rubbish.”

“We need to make sure that Jewish life is free in the UK, as it should be anywhere in the world, and we must also stand with our Muslim brothers and sisters who are facing threats from the IRGC.”

Tugendhat, who served as security minister between 2022 and 2024, advocated for the proscription of the IRGC as a terrorist entity, “because it sends an important message that the IRGC does not represent the Iranian people.”

However, like Jenrick, he claimed that authorities already have the tools to crack down on Tehran’s UK network, noting that the National Security Act already makes any cooperation with the IRGC a crime.

“The National Security Act gave increased power to bring action against these individuals… I get the symbolic point of proscription and I support it, but the key thing is to get action that closes down Khamenei's influence in the UK,” he said.

Former Tory home secretary Suella Braverman told the JC that the IRGC is “the world’s chief sponsor of terrorism” and called for proscription.

“As Home Secretary, I saw first-hand the pernicious and pervading threat posed by the IRGC to citizens in the UK,” she went on, adding that in the Middle East, the IRGC is “funding and supporting Islamist Jihadist groups and terrorism, whether it is Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, or Hamas, and many hundreds of groups attacking Western civilisation.”

“We must stand up to them and we must call out their nefarious activities and ensure we are on the side of Israel who is fighting on the front line against Iranian aggression.”

Reform MP and deputy leader Richard Tice echoed her remarks. “There is no reason not to proscribe the IRGC as a terrorist organisation like Hamas,” he said.

He condemned both the Labour and Conservative Party for “bottling” their plans to proscribe the group and claimed both had been “weak and feeble” in the face of Khamenei.

“We don’t want any extremist Islamist centres and organisations posing as phoney charities. In the UK we have to set a standard. Whether it is a phoney charity or an educational entirety, it is completely inappropriate and we have to have the courage to say not in the UK.

“The network is using the guise of charities and educational organisations, and poses a direct threat to the UK, with its two prime targets being the Iranian diaspora and the Jewish community.”