Iranian expats in the UK who oppose the religious dictatorship in Iran enjoyed a small victory after officials sacked the trustees of a charity affiliated with Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Hosseini Khamenei, and appointed an interim manager.
The UK Charity Commission’s decision to appoint Emma Moody, a charity expert lawyer from Womble Bond Dickson LLP, as interim manager of the Islamic Centre of England (ICE) was welcomed by Tom Tugendhat, the UK Minister for Security who tweeted a video in which he declared that “the actions of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps and its agents have put lives in danger in our own country.”
Alicia Kearns, the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee also tweeted that “This is a significant sanction and one of the most powerful interventions they have.”
The Islamic Centre of England (ICE) is a UK registered charity whose trustees were directly appointed by Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Hosseini Khamenei. The charity has been under investigation by the UK Charity Commission since 2020 after it held two events where speakers praised Major General Qasem Soleimani after he was killed in Iraq by a U.S. drone missile.
The Islamic Centre of England Limited is only one of the many charities affiliated with the ruling Ayatollahs in Iran. Another such body, the Islamic Human Rights Commission Trust (IHRC Trust), serves as legal adviser on immigration to the UK government and has managed to obtain settlement visas for at least 200 Iranian regime cronies in the UK according to an investigation by the Times newspaper in London.
Until recently, most UK politicians and MPs, including Shadow security minister, Holly Lynch, were not even aware of Iran’s Supreme Leader having so many outlets and charities in the UK. It was the recent uprising in Iran that focused their attention on Iran and alerted them to the Islamic Republic of Iran’s network of influence in the West.
The “Woman, Life, Freedom” protests prompted by the death of Mahsa Amini last September and the regime’s subsequent crackdown on peaceful protesters galvanised many Iranian expats to become politically active against the regime’s supporters in Western democracies.
Seyed Hashem Moussavi, the main trustee of the Islamic Center of London, appointed directly by Ayatollah Khamenei, resigned last December while the charity was under investigation. The resignation appears to be part of an effort to downplay ICE’s ties to Tehran. It wasn’t enough to stop UK regulators from removing the charity’s board of directors.
There have been frequent ongoing protests by Iranians living in the UK outside Khamenei’s outlets in London, Manchester and Birmingham. On several occasions these protesters have been attacked by pro-Khamenei thugs. For example, Voice of America Persian correspondent in London Panah Bahman in London was recently physically harassed and intimidated while filming outside the Islamic Centre of England’s premises in Maida Vale, London and his equipment was damaged.
The pro-Khamenei assailant who poured water on him while he was reporting outside the centre, tweeted later and lamented “Acid was too valuable to be thrown.”
Many Iranian expats in the UK have written to their parliamentary representatives asking them to become more aggressive in their efforts to counter the work of organizations affiliated with Iran’s Supreme Leader, citing their threats to the UK national security.
Steve McCabe, the Labour MP for Birmingham, where there is another Islamic Centre and charity affiliated with Khamenei, told FWI, “Quite frankly, if these organisations have been used as fronts to further the interests of the regime, sometimes very illegal interests, then they shouldn’t be allowed to do it. They should be stopped.”
While the UK authorities dither in tackling Tehran’s outposts in Britain, the Iranian regime is determined to hold onto its London bolthole and has been working to rid itself of any links which could be used against it.
For example, Seyed Hashem Moussavi, the main trustee of ICE who was appointed directly by Khamenei, resigned last December while the charity was under investigation. Regarded as a representative of Khamenei in the West, Moussavi came under fire for calling anti-regime protesters “soldiers of Satan.”
To further distance itself from Tehran, the charity also dropped a requirement in its by-laws that “at least one of the trustees shall be a Representative of the Supreme Spiritual Leadership of the Islamic Republic of Iran” and replaced it with a stipulation that “at least one of the trustees should be a religious scholar recognised by any popular spiritual authority of the time.”
Despite these changes, Seyed Hashem Mousavi still leads the prayers in the Centre and was at the forefront of the regime organised Al-Quds March in London. The evasive manoeuvres were not enough to prevent the British authorities from taking action, albeit after three years of investigation.
Mattie Heaven, a Conservative councillor for Coventry and the party’s Deputy Chairperson for the West Midlands Region lamented that it took so long for the Charity Commission to act, telling FWI that “all agree these outposts pose a national security risk, but no one wants to be the one to push the button and face the consequences of being branded with Islamophobia.”
Potkin Azarmehr is a London-based investigative journalist, business intelligence analyst, and TV documentary maker who was born in Iran.