Iran is using migrant smuggling routes into Britain to move covert operatives into the country, the Telegraph reported on Saturday, citing unnamed Iranian officials, people smugglers and analysts.
The newspaper said the operation was centered on Unit 700, a logistics and smuggling arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' Quds Force that Britain sanctioned in 2024 for facilitating activities intended to destabilize the UK and other countries.
According to the report, an Iranian official described Britain's support for US military operations against Iran as making it a target, telling the newspaper: "Our armed forces' message was very clear yesterday - stay away from the carnage."
The official also said: "At the moment we have people right there in London ... They wait for us to tell them what to do," adding that Tehran could "easily make London unsafe" and that "we do not need a missile to target London. It's easier than that."
A second unnamed Iranian official went further, saying Iran had people in Britain who could "even target their prime minister's house" if Tehran chose to do so, according to the newspaper.
Smuggling network
The Telegraph said two people smugglers familiar with routes into Europe told the newspaper that parts of the network were controlled by the Iranian government.
One smuggler was quoted as saying that "some legs of the network" used to move migrants into Europe "are actually owned by the government," while another said controlling a route meant "you can do what you like."
The report said the routes, originally established to move weapons, money and supplies to Iran-backed groups in the Middle East, were also being used to move migrants into Europe, including Britain.
Security experts skeptical
The newspaper said British security experts questioned whether Iran had the capability to establish long-term covert networks in Britain.
It quoted Lynette Nusbacher, a former senior adviser to the Cabinet Office on security matters, as saying Iran lacked the "strategic patience" to plant genuine covert agents in Britain, while Kristian Gustafson of Brunel University said Tehran's objective could instead be to create enough fear to weaken British support for US operations.
The report, published on Friday, followed recent remarks by Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who said the US-Israeli attack that killed Khamenei and several senior military commanders did not occur during a full meeting of Iran's Defense Council. Instead, Araghchi said, a subordinate committee of the council, chaired by the council's secretary, was meeting at the time.
According to Noor News, the committee was chaired by Ali Shamkhani and was discussing the implementation of a comprehensive plan to organize resources, personnel, structures and equipment to manage future protests, while also assessing what participants believed was an imminent US-Israeli attack on Iran.
Protest response and military planning
The outlet said officials viewed the country as facing a "multi-layered threat" combining foreign military action with the prospect of domestic unrest, making preparations for both scenarios a priority.
The protest management plan, Noor News wrote, gained urgency after nationwide protests in January 2026. Khamenei, it added, rejected a proposal to transfer responsibility for the plan to the Supreme National Security Council's secretariat and instead instructed Shamkhani to oversee its implementation until its completion.
Khamenei and Shamkhani, the report added, also emphasized reducing casualties among civilians and protesters during demonstrations, leading to the development of new equipment and procedures for managing public gatherings.
The January protests were triggered by soaring prices, a collapsing currency and deep public anger toward the Islamic Republic. What began as an economic protest quickly evolved into a nationwide political crisis, prompting one of the most intense crackdowns in the Islamic Republic’s history.
Authorities responded with internet shutdowns, mass arrests and a violent crackdown. More than 36,500 Iranians were killed by security forces during the nationwide crackdown on January 8 and 9, according to classified government documents and other evidence reviewed by Iran International's Editorial Board.
The strike began while the committee was in session, killing Shamkhani and several senior military commanders, according to Noor News. The outlet said the meeting was intended to prepare for what participants believed would be simultaneous external military action and internal unrest.
Khamenei was killed on February 28 in the opening hours of the US-Israeli war against Iran. He died in a coordinated airstrike targeting his heavily fortified compound in Tehran as part of a broader operation aimed at decapitating Iran's military and political leadership. Satellite imagery later showed extensive destruction at the compound.
Khamenei, who had ruled Iran since 1989, was 86. The Assembly of Experts subsequently appointed his son, Mojtaba Khamenei, as Iran's new Supreme Leader.
Café owners describe a renewed campaign against businesses associated with a different urban lifestyle.
Among the cafés forced to close in recent days were some located along Tehran's central streets. Some had previously been shuttered over allegations they failed to enforce Iran's compulsory hijab rules.
The latest wave followed public appeals by Friday prayer leaders for tougher action.
“The situation regarding hijab in society is not acceptable,” Mohammad Reza Naseri, the Friday prayer imam of Yazd, said on July 17, urging officials and cultural institutions to confront what he described as “corruption and indecency.”
In the northern city of Rasht, Friday prayer imam Rasoul Falahati praised pro-government nighttime gatherings and argued that confronting what he called “organized unveiling” should also involve public participation. Falahati urged the government and parliament to fully implement Iran's hijab law.
Days later, café owners in central Tehran found their businesses sealed.
'They saw us as the odd ones out'
The owner of a café on Sanaii Street in Tehran, which was closed on July 20, told Iran International that unusual pressure had built over recent weeks, saying organizers of nighttime gatherings appeared to view cafés such as his as incompatible with the atmosphere they wanted to create.
According to the owner, plainclothes men carrying radios and firearms visited the café twice in the days before the funeral of Ali Khamenei, the slain leader of the Islamic Republic, describing the business, its staff and customers as “a stain of shame” and “the enemy's foot soldiers.”
“One of them said our city was preparing for the funeral of the leader, yet you are here engaged in pleasure, music and corruption,” the owner recalled.
He said he warned employees that closure appeared imminent.
A young woman who managed the dining area at another shuttered café on the same street said rumors of inspections had circulated the previous day, but the conduct of officials still came as a shock.
“The way they stormed in and behaved was so aggressive and disrespectful that everyone was stunned,” she said. “Some colleagues did not even have time to collect their personal belongings before the café was closed.”
Wartime images told a different story
The closures stand in sharp contrast with scenes seen only weeks earlier.
During the 40-day war and its aftermath, women without compulsory hijab appeared openly at pro-establishment nighttime gatherings and at Ali Khamenei's funeral. State media interviewed some of them, and their images appeared in official coverage.
Religious singers also adopted a noticeably different tone.
“A woman with loose hijab who has come to the square is the light of our eyes and the daughter of our country,” one speaker said during a gathering.
The imagery contrasted with years of rhetoric from parts of Iran's political and religious establishment portraying women who reject compulsory hijab as posing an ideological challenge to the Islamic Republic.
The difference appeared less a change in official thinking on compulsory hijab than a reflection of changing political priorities. At a moment when authorities sought to project national unity and broad public participation, women with different styles of dress became part of the official narrative. As that period faded, so did the visible tolerance.
The pattern extended beyond dress.
State media also featured rappers performing songs supporting the system and Iran's armed forces, despite rap music facing years of official restrictions and criticism.
The contrast illustrated a broader pattern. Different forms of dress, music or cultural expression appeared acceptable when reinforcing an official political message but faced restrictions once they existed outside that framework.
Pressure spreads beyond Tehran
The closures in central Tehran form part of a broader campaign affecting businesses across Iran.
On May 19, the historic Ameri House hotel complex in the central city of Kashan was closed over what authorities described as failure to observe mandatory hijab rules.
On June 15, the judiciary's Mizan news agency reported that prosecutors ordered a Tehran café closed and opened a criminal case against its managers after images circulated online from an event authorities said violated legal and religious standards.
The campaign expanded elsewhere.
On July 2, the public prosecutor of Kohgiluyeh County announced the closure of 10 cafés and teahouses in Dehdasht for allegedly failing to observe religious standards.
Less than three weeks later, the Mohseni Mansion, a restored historic Qajar-era property operating as a hotel and restaurant in the southern city of Behbahan, was shut over what officials described as optional hijab among some customers and the playing of music.
Authorities in Lorestan, Ardebil and Aran va Bidgol have also announced closures of businesses over accusations including unveiling, failure to observe Islamic standards, moral violations.
Competing accounts
Officials and business owners offer different explanations for the closures.
Tasnim News Agency, which is affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, rejected suggestions that the cafés had been targeted over morality enforcement. The businesses, it said, were closed solely because of licensing and trade violations and that the action had “no connection” to moral security.
Café owners dispute that account.
They describe earlier warnings, visits by plainclothes personnel, scrutiny of customers' clothing and growing pressure surrounding the atmosphere inside their businesses. Their accounts differ sharply from the official explanation and leave unanswered questions about the principal reason behind the closures.
For many owners, the consequences extend beyond politics. Many cafés had already struggled amid economic stagnation, falling purchasing power, internet disruptions and a sharp decline in customers. Sudden closure leaves employees without wages, rent unpaid and businesses facing taxes and debts despite being unable to operate.
"The country will certainly face significant unrest among workers by the end of the summer if the current trend continues," Akbar Shokat, executive secretary of the Workers' House in Qom province, told the ILNA news agency.
Many workers, according to ILNA, who were temporarily laid off during the conflict and turned to jobs such as ride-hailing to make ends meet have since been recalled to factories, only to find that wages for June and July remain unpaid. Having returned to work, they are also no longer eligible for unemployment benefits.
Most Iranian workers, Shokat said, already live below the poverty line after years of wage suppression, leaving them with little capacity to absorb further economic pressure.
Employers accused of withholding wages
Shokat accused some employers of exploiting the current economic conditions by reducing production and delaying wage payments despite having sufficient raw materials and finished goods in storage.
"Some employers are taking advantage of the current situation," he said, adding that businesses which accumulated wealth over previous decades had a moral responsibility not to shift the burden of the crisis onto workers.
He urged the government to introduce emergency economic measures, including customs exemptions for imported raw materials and bank financing for manufacturers, to help companies continue operations and prevent further wage delays.
Shokat also called for legal action against employers who withhold workers' wages while stockpiling goods.
Strikes spread across sectors
ILNA has reported a growing number of labor protests in recent weeks.
On June 23, the agency reported that 1,600 workers at Tabriz Machinery Group stopped work after two months without pay, demanding payment of wages owed for May and June.
Earlier, healthcare workers in Islam-Abad-e Gharb of Kermanshah province gathered to protest low wages, delayed payments and worsening living conditions, criticizing what they described as unequal pay across Iran's health system and incomes that remain well below the poverty line.
Economic pressures deepen
The labor concerns come as Iran's economy faces mounting pressure following the conflict with the United States. The rial has weakened sharply against foreign currencies in the open market, with the US dollar trading above 1.91 million rials.
Separately, Saeed Shojaei, deputy planning minister at the Ministry of Industry, Mine and Trade, told the Ettelaat newspaper on July 15 that financial losses from electricity shortages affecting industry are expected to increase from about 3,030 trillion rials in the 2024 to 4,730 trillion rials in 2025.
Shojaei warned that if current conditions persist, unemployment could increase during the second half of the year.
