Jury convicts 2 men of plotting to assassinate an Iranian American journalist in New York

NEW YORK (AP) — Two purported mobsters were convicted Thursday of plotting to assassinate Iranian American journalist Masih Alinejad at her home in New York City in a murder-for-hire scheme that prosecutors said was financed by Iran's government.

The verdict was returned at a federal court in New York, ending a two-week trial that featured dramatic testimony from a hired gunman and Alinejad, an author, activist and contributor to Voice of America.

Alinejad, who was not in court, told The Associated Press she cried when she learned of the verdict.

“I am relieved that after nearly three years, the men who plotted to kill me have been found guilty. But make no mistake, the real masterminds of this crime are still in power in Iran,” she said. “Right now I am bombarded with emotions. I have cried. I have laughed. I have even danced.”

Alinejad called the verdict “a powerful gift from the American government” to the people of Iran because it shows that justice is beginning to be served.

Acting U.S. Attorney Matthew Podolsky said in a statement that the verdicts sent a message that “if you target U.S. citizens, we will find you, no matter where you are, and bring you to justice.”

Leslie R. Backschies, who heads the FBI's New York office, said the verdicts show that the “Iranian government's shameless conduct and attempt to violate our laws and assassinate a critic of their human rights atrocities will not be tolerated.”

Prosecutors said the convicted men, Rafat Amirov and Polad Omarov, were crime bosses in the Russian mob. Defense lawyers argued at trial that their clients were innocent and evidence was flawed.

“We respect the jury's verdict, but plan on filing an appeal on Mr. Omarov's behalf,” Elena Fast, an attorney for Omarov, said via email. A lawyer for Amirov did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Alinejad, 48, was targeted by Iran for her online campaigns encouraging women there to record videos of themselves exposing their hair in violation of edicts requiring they cover it in public.

Prosecutors said Iranian intelligence officials first plotted in 2020 and 2021 to kidnap her in the U.S. and move her to Iran to silence her criticism.

When that failed, Iran offered $500,000 for a July 2022 killing of Alinejad after efforts to harass, smear and intimidate her failed, prosecutors said.

American officials have accused Iran of backing several assassination plots in the United States, including against President Donald Trump when he was campaigning last year. Tehran has denied being behind any such plots.

Alinejad testified last week that she came to the United States in 2009 after she was banned from covering Iran's disputed presidential election and the newspaper where she worked was shut down.

Establishing herself in New York City, she built an online audience of millions and launched her “My Stealthy Freedom” campaign, telling Iranian women to send photos and videos exposing of them showing their hair when the morality police were not around.

Soon, she said, she had inspired women to take to the streets in Iran on Wednesdays to peacefully protest, leading the government to arrest hundreds of them. The crackdown only caused her following to grow, however.

Prosecutors said at trial that by 2022, the Iranian government had enlisted organized crime figures including Amirov and Omarov to kill Alinejad.

Khalid Mehdiyev, a former member of the Russian mob who lived Yonkers and worked at a pizzeria, testified that he was hired as the hitman. Like Amirov and Omarov, he is from Azerbaijan, which shares a border and cultural ties with Iran.

Mehdiyev, who cooperated with prosecutors after pleading guilty to multiple crimes, said he bought an AK-47 to kill Alinejad but the plan was foiled when his car was stopped by police and the gun was found in the back seat in July 2022. A doorbell camera at Alinejad's home recorded Mehdiyev standing on her front porch.

Prosecutors have kept the investigation open. In October they announced charges against a senior Iranian military official and three others, none of whom are in custody.

In a separate case, U.S. prosecutors in 2022 charged a man in Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard with plotting to kill former U.S. national security adviser John Bolton.

Iranian officials vowed to exact revenge against Trump and others in his former administration over the 2020 drone strike that killed the prominent Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad.

Alinejad said she has had to move nearly two dozen times since the assassination plot was discovered, at times feeling guilty that so many of her followers in Iran lack a safety net.

That, she said, only “makes me more determined to give voice to voiceless people.”

Masih Alinejad greets friends and supporters outside the federal courthouse after testifying at the trial of two men accused of allegedly plotting to kill her in New York, Tuesday, March 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Masih Alinejad greets friends and supporters outside the federal courthouse after testifying at the trial of her alleged would-be assassins in New York, Tuesday, March 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Masih Alinejad greets friends and supporters outside the federal courthouse after testifying at the trial of her would-be assassins in New York, Tuesday, March 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Masih Alinejad blows a kiss to supporters outside the federal courthouse after testifying at the trial of her would-be assassins in New York, Tuesday, March 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

FILE - Masih Alinejad, 48, a prominent Iranian American human rights activist gives an interview Press in Berlin, Nov. 9, 2024. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi, File)

Masih Alinejad greets friends and supporters outside the federal courthouse after testifying at the trial of her would-be assassins in New York, Tuesday, March 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Masih Alinejad greets friends and supporters outside the federal courthouse after testifying at the trial of two men accused of allegedly plotting to kill her in New York, Tuesday, March 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Masih Alinejad greets friends and supporters outside the federal courthouse after testifying at the trial of her would-be assassins in New York, Tuesday, March 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

CAIRO (AP) — Sudan ’s military on Saturday consolidated its grip on the capital, retaking more key government buildings a day after it gained control of the Republican Palace from a notorious paramilitary group.

Brig. Gen. Nabil Abdullah, a spokesperson for the Sudanese military, said troops expelled the Rapid Support Forces from the headquarters of the National Intelligence Service and Corinthia Hotel in central Khartoum.

The army also retook the headquarters of the Central Bank of Sudan and other government and educational buildings in the area, Abdullah said. Hundreds of RSF fighters were killed while trying to flee the capital city, he said.

There was no immediate comment from the RSF.

The army's gain came as a Sudanese pro-democracy activist group said RSF fighters had killed at least 45 people in a city in the western region of Darfur.

On Friday, the military retook the Republican Palace, the prewar seat of the government, in a major symbolic victory for the Sudanese military in its nearly two years of war against the RSF.

A drone attack on the palace Friday believed to have been launched by the RSF killed two journalists and a driver with Sudanese state television, according to the ministry of information. Lt. Col. Hassan Ibrahim, from the military’s media office, was also killed in the attack, the military said.

Volker Perthes, former UN envoy for Sudan, the latest military advances will force the RSF to withdraw to its stronghold in the western region of Darfur.

“The army has gained an important and significant victory in Khartoum militarily and politically,” Perthes told The Associated Press, adding that the military will soon clear the capital and its surrounding areas from the RSF.

But the advances doesn’t mean the end of the war as the RSF holds territory in the western Darfur region and elsewhere. Perthes argued that the war will likely turn into an insurgency between the Darfur-based RSF and the military-led government in the capital.

“The RSF will be largely restricted to Darfur ... We will return to the early 2000s,” he said, in reference to the conflict between rebel groups and the Khartoum government, then led by former President Omar al-Bashir.

At the start of the war in April 2023, the RSF took over multiple government and military buildings in the capital including the Republican Palace, the headquarters of the state television and the besieged military’s headquarters, known as the General Command. It also occupied people’s houses and turned it into bases for their attacks against troops.

In recent months, the military took the lead in the fighting. It reclaimed much of Khartoum and its sister cities of Omdurman and Khartoum North, along with other cities elsewhere in the country. In late January, troops lifted the RSF siege on the General Command, paving the way to retake the palace less than two months later.

The military is now likely to try to retake the Khartoum International Airport, only some 2.5 kilometers (1.5 miles) southeast of the palace, which has been held by the RSF since the start of the war. Videos posted on social media Saturday purportedly showed soldiers on a road leading to the airport.

The RSF was accused on Saturday of being responsible for the deaths of at least 45 people in the Darfur city of al-Maliha.

The pro-democracy Resistance Committees, a network of youth groups tracking the war, said the RSF entered the city on Thursday and carried out attacks. The dead included at least a dozen women, according to a partial casualty list published by the group.

Al-Maliha, a strategic desert city in North Darfur near the borders with Chad and Libya, is around 200 kilometers (125 miles) north of the city of el-Fasher, which remains held by the Sudanese military despite near-daily strikes by besieging RSF.

The war, which has wrecked the capital and other urban cities, has claimed the lives of more than 28,000 people, forced millions more to flee their homes and left some families eating grass in a desperate attempt to survive as famine sweeps parts of the country. Other estimates suggest a far higher death toll.

The fighting has been marked by atrocities including mass rape and ethnically motivated killings that amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity, especially in the western region of Darfur, according to the United Nations and international rights groups.

A Sudan army soldier holds a national flag to celebrate after the army take over the Republican Palace in Khartoum, Sudan, Friday, March 21, 2025. (AP Photo)

An army soldier walks in front of the damaged Republican Palace in Khartoum, Sudan, after it was taken over by Sudan's army Friday, March 21, 2025. (AP Photo)

Army soldiers walk in front of the damaged Republican Palace in Khartoum, Sudan, after it was taken over by Sudan's army Friday, March 21, 2025. (AP Photo)

An army soldier walks in front of the damaged Republican Palace in Khartoum, Sudan, after it was taken over by Sudan's army Friday, March 21, 2025. (AP Photo)

Sudan army soldiers celebrate after they took over the Republican Palace in Khartoum, Sudan, Friday, March 21, 2025. (AP Photo)