Two men convicted of wounding journalist ‘on orders of Iran’

Two men have been found guilty of involvement in a targeted knife attack on an Iranian journalist in London said to have been carried out on behalf of the regime in Tehran. Pouria Zeraati, a British journalist of Iranian origin, was working for Iran International, a Farsi-language dissident broadcaster, when he was stabbed in the leg outside his west London home in 2024. On Friday, jurors found Nandito Badea, 21, and George Stana, 25, guilty of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm. The Romanians, who had denied the charges, will be sentenced at the Old Bailey on 3 July. A third man accused of involvement, David Andrei, was arrested in Romania but was not involved in the trial at Woolwich crown court in south-east London. Pouria Zeraati, a British journalist of Iranian origin, was stabbed three times in the thigh as he walked to his Wimbledon home. Photograph: @POURIAZERAATI Zeraati was stabbed three times in the thigh as he walked to his Wimbledon home in 2024, in a “planned attack preceded by reconnaissance which was ordered by a third party acting on behalf of the Iranian state”. Prosecutors said the pair had targeted Zeraati, whose channel’s opposition coverage and Saudi backing led Tehran to designate it as a terrorist organisation in 2022. Jurors were shown images of posters in Tehran that featured journalists including Zeraati with the words “Wanted: dead or alive”. …