Ali Ansari, accused of financing Revolutionary Guards, owns Mallorca golf club and Frankfurt hotels via offshore companies

An Iranian tycoon under sanctions in the UK for allegedly financing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has funnelled hundreds of millions of euros into a sprawling property portfolio across mainland Europe.

Ali Ansari, whose family founded failed Iranian lender Ayandeh Bank, amassed luxury properties ranging from a golf resort in Mallorca to an Austrian ski hotel, according to corporate filings reviewed by the FT.

The UK sanctioned him after Ayandeh’s collapse in October for funding “hostile activity” by Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards force, branding Ansari a “corrupt Iranian banker and businessman” and freezing a London property portfolio worth more than £150 million.

The FT has now identified a complex web of offshore companies, spanning from Luxembourg and St Kitts and Nevis to Austria, Germany and Spain, through which Ansari amassed a vast, previously unreported collection of properties in mainland Europe.

⚽️🚨 حکم بازداشت و مصادره اموال مهدی قایدی، شهاب زاهدی، فغانی و فرهاد مجیدی به دلیل تشویش اذهان عمومی صادر شد و درصورت ورود به ایران بازداشت میشن!

🚨👤 میدل ایست : همه اموال علی دایی به ارزش 50 میلیون دلار به علت حمایت او از مردم مصادره شده است!!

پ.ن: جمهوری اسلامی لحظه به لحظه…

— AliVafaei(علی وفایی)🇮🇱🇺🇸🇮🇱🇩🇪 (@dashalivafaei) January 25, 2026

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اتحادیه جهانی کشتی، تمام کشتی‌گیران ایران را از مسابقات کرواسی کنار گذاشت

Iran confiscates assets of football stars

The Iranian judiciary has ordered the confiscation of all assets worth approximately $50 million belonging to football legend Ali Daei.

Axar.az reports, citing Middle East 24.

It was also reported that the assets of Sardar Azmoun, a Turkmen footballer for the Iranian national team, have been confiscated.

According to the report, this is part of a large-scale raid aimed at punishing those involved in the recent unrest.

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The death toll by the occupying Islamic Republic against own citizens at 36,500 according to their own estimate

More than 36,500 Iranians were killed by security forces during the January 8-9 crackdown on nationwide protests, according to classified documents @IranIntl received. That's even more than @TIME's report.

Reading these figures and watching the absolutely inadequate…

— Jason Brodsky (@JasonMBrodsky) January 25, 2026

Iran president’s son urges authorities to restore internet after protest blackout

Yousef Pezeshkian says nothing will be solved by trying to postpone moment footage of violent crackdown circulate

The son of Iran's president has called for the internet restrictions in the country to be lifted, saying nothing will be solved by trying to postpone the moment when pictures and video circulate of the protests that were violently crushed by the regime.

With a battle under way at the top of the regime about the political risks of continuing to block Iran from the internet, Yousef Pezeshkian, whose father, Masoud, was elected in the summer of 2024, said keeping the digital shutdown would create dissatisfaction and widen the gap between the people and the government.

This means those who were not and are not dissatisfied will be added to the list of the dissatisfied,” he wrote in a Telegram post. The release of videos showing the violence of the protests was “something we will have to face sooner or later”, Yousef Pezeshkian added. “Shutting down the internet will not solve anything, we will just postpone the issue.

The sporadic lifting of restrictions is leading to a slow and painful inquest into how many protesters, including children, have died. Authorities launched a violent crackdown under cover of the internet blackout, with rights groups documenting several thousand dead. The Norway-based NGO Iran Human Rights says the final figure could be as high as 25,000. Thousands more people are still being detained.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jan/25/iran-presidents-son-urges-authorities-to-restore-internet-after-protest-blackout