Iranian threat to British public soars 'significantly' in just three years, Parliament's intelligence watchdog reveals

The watchdog also warned that the "physical threat" from Tehran had "significantly increased", with Iranian dissidents and Jewish and Israeli interests in the firing line.

The threat, it added, was now "comparable with that posed by Russia".

The watchdog's report only covers a period between early 2022 and August 2023.

As a result, the Iranian threat to Britain is not taken into account despite skyrocketing tensions in the Middle East following the October 7 Hamas attacks and the following conflict between Israel and Iran's proxies.

But the committee insisted that, despite these changes, its recommendations remained "relevant".

But in that short time, the report found there had been at least 15 attempts at murder or kidnap against British nationals or residents.

It also warned that the UK remained a target for Iranian espionage, but it found that that was "narrower in scope and scale" and "less sophisticated" than the threats from Russia and China.

The watchdog also criticised a "lack of Iran-specific expertise", saying there was "seemingly no interest in building a future pipeline of specialists" in Whitehall.

One witness told the committee: "If you have people running policy in the Foreign Office who don't speak a word of Persian, then that is a fat lot of good."

In recent weeks, the Government has been urged to step in and proscribe the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps - Iran's military - as a terrorist organisation.

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MPs, peers, think tanks and more of all persuasions have told the Home Office to act against the IRGC in the same way as it did to Palestine Action after RAF Brize Norton was broken into and planes were attacked.

Luke Akehurst, Labour MP for North Durham, said: "I thoroughly welcome the move to proscribe Palestine Action after their violent attacks on defence companies and, most alarmingly, on RAF Brize Norton.

"It's now urgent, given the conflict in Iran, that the Government moves to proscribe the IRGC, which is a terrorist organisation that represents a significant threat, including here in the UK."

The Government has also been urged to make clear to Tehran that kidnap or murder attempts would "constitute an attack on the UK and would receive the appropriate response".

Nigel Farage, meanwhile, warned The Telegraph: "The Iranian regime has clearly been funding propaganda hubs and promoting terror throughout the UK."

Farage, alongside scores of politicians across the British right, went on to meet Reza Pahlavi - the son of the last Shah of Iran.

"When will Starmer stand up to the Ayatollah and proscribe the IRGC?" the Reform chief asked.

Committee chairman Lord Beamish said: "Iran poses a wide-ranging, persistent and unpredictable threat to the UK, UK nationals and UK interests.

"As the committee was told, Iran is there across the full spectrum of all the kinds of threats we have to be concerned with," he added.