This text is the results of a collaboration with The Sunday Instances. You’ll find their corresponding piece right here.
Bellingcat and The Sunday Instances final week revealed images exhibiting ex-UFC fighter Mounir “The Sniper” Lazzez with needed cartel leaders Christy and Daniel Kinahan.
The pictures, captured through the 971 Combating Championship in Dubai final June, mark the latest sighting of the Irish narco-traffickers because the US authorities put multi-million greenback bounties on their heads in 2022.
At completely different factors through the six-hour combat night time, Lazzez, who ran the occasion on the Coca-Cola Enviornment, is seen speaking to each crime bosses, who had been seated cageside at reverse ends of the entrance row, on white sofas designated for VIPs.
Lazzez is captured with Daniel Kinahan in a since-deleted high-resolution picture uploaded to an expert photographer’s web site, and in an image posted to Instagram by a spectator.
He’s additionally seen within the official live-stream. About two hours in, Lazzez faucets Christy Kinahan, the founding father of the eponymous drug cartel, on the arm. Three hours later, he crouches in entrance of the 68-year-old whereas taking a look at this cellphone, earlier than sitting on the arm of Kinahan’s chair.
As we speak, we reveal that Lazzez — an outspoken supporter of Daniel Kinahan — has enterprise pursuits extending far past the world of fight sports activities.
Paperwork uncovered by Bellingcat hyperlink the 38-year-old to multimillion greenback transport offers, orchestrated by firms in a secrecy jurisdiction, for crude oil tankers that had been later sanctioned by the US authorities for serving to the Iranian regime.
The corporations that purchased these ships had been headquartered at an tackle used for registering offshore firms — together with a separate agency that owned a Kinahan cartel-linked bulk service loaded with greater than two tonnes of cocaine.
Who’s Mounir Lazzez?
Lazzez has been held up as an icon on this planet of fight sports activities as the primary Arab born-and-raised fighter to be signed to the UFC.
Initially from the port metropolis of Sfax in Tunisia, he mentioned he had a “powerful life” and needed to “combat to get all the pieces”. In a single interview, Lazzez defined how he began MMA courses as a teen. A “skinny child” who was being bullied, his dad and mom thought the game would increase his confidence.
Ultimately, Lazzez mentioned, he went on to compete nationally after which, in his early 20s, moved to Canada to hone his abilities. It was a “enterprise alternative” that drew him to Dubai, the place he additionally began his skilled MMA profession.
The 6’1″ welterweight was signed to the UFC in 2020 after being really helpful to long-time president Dana White by a pal of White’s teenage son. Incomes the nickname “The Sniper” for his precision strikes, he fought 4 instances between 2020 and 2023.
For the latter a part of his MMA profession, Lazzez was represented by MTK World, the now-defunct sports activities administration firm co-founded by Daniel Kinahan, who authorities have mentioned is accountable for managing the cartel’s drug trafficking operation.
Lazzez has spoken publicly about his relationship with Daniel Kinahan, describing him as a “good pal, brother and advisor”. In 2021, he wrote on social media: “I’ve by no means met a person like him”.
He made headlines in 2022 when he thanked Kinahan from inside the cage after a win in Las Vegas. “With out him, I’d by no means be the person who I’m at the moment,” Lazzez informed the gang.
When questioned about his feedback later, Lazzez mentioned the cartel boss – who had been sanctioned simply days earlier than — was “a pal and adviser.”
Now retired from fight sports activities, Lazzez had, till lately, lived in Dubai and was listed because the part-owner of a fitness center, the 971 MMA & Health Academy, within the industrial district of Al Quoz.
He launched the 971 Combating Championship in 2024, promising to “change the face” of fight sports activities. Final yr’s outing on the Coca-Cola Enviornment was its second occasion.
However our investigation has uncovered information tying Lazzez to different ventures earlier than he began the 971 Combating Championship.
In 2023, he was listed because the director of two firms that paid greater than $80 million for 2 oil tankers. Each ships had been sanctioned the next yr for his or her roles in helping the Iranian regime.
The Sunday Instances has beforehand reported on the Kinahan cartel’s involvement in arms smuggling and cash laundering, and its alliances with different crime fraternities. Among the many gang’s alleged shoppers are Iran’s intelligence providers and the Lebanon-based Islamic militant group Hezbollah.
The brand new findings uncovered on this investigation increase critical questions on Lazzez’s relationship with essentially the most senior members of the US-sanctioned Kinahan Organised Crime Group.
Bellingcat contacted Mounir Lazzez by cellphone, e-mail and social media however didn’t obtain a response.
A workers member who answered the cellphone at Dubai’s 971 MMA & Health Academy mentioned Lazzez has had no involvement within the enterprise since October 2025. Requested how Lazzez may very well be contacted, the person mentioned: “That’s the issue, we don’t have something from him since he left. He doesn’t work right here with us anymore.”
A collection of messages and calls to the fitness center’s administration and two different homeowners weren’t answered.
Additional enquiries final week discovered that Lazzez had moved to Italy, the place his spouse is from, late final yr. In October, Marco Fioravanti, the mayor of Ascoli Piceno, a city in central Italy, posted a photograph of him assembly with the ex-UFC fighter.
An area information report revealed in December mentioned the “fight sports activities icon” was now providing private coaching periods from two gyms within the area. “As we speak, my motivation is educating,” Lazzez was quoted as saying. “I’ve lived the athlete’s life on the highest degree, and now I need to cross on my expertise to others.”
New Instagram and Fb profiles arrange underneath the identify “ML MMA & Health” and promoting private coaching with Lazzez included an e-mail tackle in his identify and an Italian cellular quantity.
The social media accounts had been deleted or made non-public final week instantly after Bellingcat despatched messages. Telephone calls and emails to Lazzez weren’t returned.
Lazzez, who based the 971 Combating Championship in 2024, mentioned he was centered on increasing the occasion. After the 14-bout card final June, the 971 FC Instagram web page requested followers who they needed to see carry out on the subsequent combat night time, and posted: “We’re simply getting began”. Lazzez mentioned there was “extra within the pipeline”. In an interview on the time, he was additionally quoted saying: “This isn’t only a enterprise. We’re not doing this for revenue. That is about legacy.”
After greater than a decade dwelling within the UAE, it’s not identified why Lazzez and his younger household relocated to Italy in current months.
MMA to Multi-Million Maritime Offers
Bellingcat ran Mounir Lazzez’s identify by open supply company databases to find out if he was concerned in any enterprise actions aside from his Dubai fitness center, the 971 Combating Championship, and his new enterprise in Italy.
Two outcomes had been returned through Horizons, a platform that aggregates public information and which was created by Washington DC-based nonprofit C4ADS. The information, sourced from the Panama Flag Registry, embrace title paperwork exhibiting the homeowners of ships registered underneath the Panama flag up till August 2024.
In every of the transport paperwork, Lazzez’s signature is said genuine by a named ambassador or consul common of Panama. Lazzez’s technique of identification used within the sale of Serene I, which was detailed within the paperwork, was an Italian passport.
Bellingcat confirmed Lazzez’s Italian passport quantity by a Bing search, which returned a doc from the Authorities of Dubai’s official web site exhibiting that it was used on a industrial licence for 9 Seven One Rising Blended Martial Arts Academy LLC — the entity behind Lazzez’s fitness center, 971 MMA & Health Academy.
Lazzez posted on social media in 2022 about changing into an Italian citizen.
Company paperwork record Lazzez as certainly one of three homeowners of 9 Seven One Rising Blended Martial Arts Academy LLC. In line with the paperwork, Lazzez has a 25 per cent share within the enterprise.
The opposite two homeowners are each residents of the Caribbean Island of Dominica. Considered one of these folks, in response to their public profiles, studied regulation in Iran and specialises in maritime regulation. The opposite is known as within the Panama Papers and seems to be concerned within the world transport trade.
Neither of those folks responded to questions from Bellingcat.
Dragon Highway and Religion Enterprise had been each arrange in 2023, three months and one month respectively earlier than shopping for the vessels, in response to information accessed through Worldwide Registries, Inc.
Dragon Highway was annulled in September 2024, the identical month the sanctions had been imposed. Religion Enterprise was dissolved in September 2024, 9 weeks earlier than the ship it purchased was sanctioned.
The names of firm administrators, shareholders and useful homeowners will not be publicly accessible within the Republic of the Marshall Islands. Whereas Lazzez was listed because the director of Dragon Highway and Religion Enterprise in 2023, in response to the paperwork accessed through Horizons, it’s not identified if he was nonetheless a director in 2024. It’s also unknown if these firms had different administrators on the time.
What is thought from the paperwork filed with the Panama Flag Registry is that each corporations had been headquartered at a Marshall Islands tackle that’s generally used for registering offshore firms, together with Matthew Maritime Inc, which owned cocaine freighter the MV Matthew.
The Panamanian-flagged vessel was seized off the Irish coast in September 2023 and located to be carrying greater than two tonnes of South American cocaine price €157 million. It was the most important medicine seizure in Irish historical past.
The smuggling operation was reportedly a part of a conspiracy involving the Kinahans and the Colombian Clan del Golfo. It was additionally reported that the operation was directed from Dubai, and that authorities suspected the involvement of Hezbollah and the Iranian authorities.
Connor Plunkett, Peter Barth, Beau Donelly and John Mooney contributed to this text. Scroll-driven interactive by Connor Plunkett and Miguel Ramalho.
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