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British couple jailed in Iran have lost appeal against convictions, family say

A British couple jailed on spying charges in Iran have lost an appeal against their convictions, their family has said. Craig and Lindsay Foreman, both aged 53, were handed 10-year prison sentences in February after being convicted of espionage, which they deny. The couple’s family, from East Sussex, have claimed they were not permitted to attend their appeal hearing. They were jailed after their arrest in January 2025 while travelling through Iran during a round-the-world trip by motorcycle. Lindsay Foreman’s son, Joe Bennett, said “the dial needs to shift” as he explained the pair “don’t understand the process”. He said: “My mum, Lindsay, and stepdad, Craig, were not permitted to attend their own appeal hearing. “We don’t know if they received a proper account of what was argued on their behalf. “We know they had been asked to sign documents … documents they could not read, and they refused, but we don’t know the details of when, or what they were. “Their case has now passed to the supreme court, but we don’t understand the process, the timeline, or what, if anything, will be submitted in their name.” The couple’s family members said Craig Foreman is on day 25 of a hunger strike and his wife is on day 16 of hers at Tehran’s Evin prison, adding that all communication between them has been cut off by Iranian authorities. Bennett said he met officials at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) on Monday but left without “clarity on what pressure is being applied to Tehran”. In a statement, the FCDO said: “We are disappointed by the appeal decision and will continue working to ensure that Craig and Lindsay are returned safely to the UK. “Since their arrest last year, Britain’s ambassador to Tehran, diplomats and officials in London have been working to provide consular assistance. “This includes the ambassador visiting them in prison and facilitating calls with their family back in the UK. “Minister Falconer last met the family on 18 May and the foreign secretary on 17 March. “Both set out to them personally how unjustified and appalling we consider Lindsay and Craig’s incarceration to be, and the action that the UK government is taking to try and secure their release.” The FCDO warns all British and British-Iranian nationals not to travel to Iran because of a “significant risk of arrest, questioning or detention”.

Why Benjamin Netanyahu poses an obstacle to US and Iran peace deal

If there is to be a peace deal between the United States and Iran, it will have to go through a familiar obstacle: Benjamin Netanyahu. Israel’s military operations in Lebanon have become a sticking point in the talks for a potential opening of the strait of Hormuz – once again testing the volatile alliance between Donald Trump and Netanyahu. This time, the Israeli prime minister is under exceptional pressure to show that his campaigns against Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran have brought results as he faces elections with his political survival at risk. The Israeli leader’s threats on Monday to bomb the southern suburbs of Beirut in order to dislodge Hezbollah led Iran to say it would cut off negotiations with the United States until that conflict was frozen. Trump, facing the collapse of talks after he had claimed a deal was imminent, replied: “I think we’ve been talking too much.” The crisis culminated in a phone call – by one account stormy – between Trump and Netanyahu. “What the fuck are you doing?” Trump said to the Israeli prime minister, one official told Axios, a US outlet that has frequently had inside access to Trump’s frustration with Netanyahu. “You’d be in prison if it weren’t for me,” another person characterised Trump’s remarks. That account is disputed. Israel’s Channel 12 said the focus was a misunderstanding between the two men: “Trump felt Netanyahu implied the war was continuing at full intensity, while Netanyahu felt Trump implied a total ceasefire,” wrote Amit Segal, the channel’s chief political analyst, citing a close aide to Netanyahu. “There was a little glitch today, but I turned that one around very quickly, as you probably noticed earlier,” Trump later told ABC News. Netanyahu has seen five US presidents since he first served as Israel’s prime minister in 1996 and has famously gotten under the skin of all of them. (“Who’s the fucking superpower here?” Bill Clinton was said to have exclaimed after their first meeting in 1996.) But it is a uniquely fraught moment for Netanyahu. On Monday, the Knesset voted 106-0 to pass the first reading of a bill to dissolve Israel’s parliament, and early elections are expected in the autumn. After earlier surges in polling following successful strikes on Iran’s leadership, Netanyahu’s popularity rating has slumped as the war in Iran, as well as conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon, have dragged on. “He’s got no story going into this election, and so he needs to either somehow achieve victory in Lebanon, or if not victory, at least like tell the story that he’s still fighting,” said Ilan Goldenberg, a former special adviser on the Middle East to Vice-President Kamala Harris and previously as the Iran team chief at the Department of Defense. He is now chief policy officer at J Street, a lobbying and advocacy group that calls itself “pro-Israel, pro-peace”. “He needs this so he can say: I’m still working for total victory,” Goldenberg said. “It’s a much better story for him than: this is done, and, essentially, I’ve failed to actually dislodge any of these threats.” And hearings also resumed this week in a long-delayed trial in which Netanyahu is charged with fraud and bribery. Netanyahu has regularly used his position as prime minister of a country under threat to delay the trial – potentially linking his freedom to the question of whether he remains in office. While the Israeli PM was successful in lobbying Trump to strike Iran together, Trump’s own political considerations in the United States may now take precedence. Despite his public claims that he was not concerned about the midterms, Trump has regularly turned back to economic data – including petrol prices – to claim his administration has been successful. Over the Memorial Day holiday weekend, average prices across the United States were the highest they have been since Covid. And the timely leak of details of his call to Netanyahu may indicate that the Trump administration wants to be seen as tough on Israel to avoid allegations that Israel’s PM is calling the shots. After the call, Netanyahu confirmed that Israel would not strike Beirut if it was not struck by Hezbollah. At least eight people were killed on Tuesday in Israeli drone strikes, hours after Trump and Netanyahu agreed to dial back the fighting. The other question remains Iran. The government has maintained a stranglehold on 20% of the global oil trade by shutting the strait of Hormuz, betting that the economic pain would sway the US in negotiations. But a US blockade has also crippled Iran’s economy, threatening the long-term viability of its oil industry and the regime’s own source of funding. Whether Israel’s ongoing military operations in Lebanon – Netanyahu’s main leverage point on the negotiations – remains a red line for Iran remains to be seen. Other incentives including unfreezing Tehran’s frozen assets could sweeten the deal for Iran. But Trump, who harshly criticised Barack Obama for approving the release of frozen assets under his Iran nuclear deal, is loathe to do the same. Trump, meanwhile, has continued to say he’s close to inking a deal. “I still have to get a few more points,” he told ABC News. Later he added: “We’re going to get what we need.”

‘We don’t have another country to run to’: Kenyans fear US plan for Ebola quarantine site

People from a town in central Kenya where the US wants to set up an Ebola quarantine facility for its citizens have strongly criticised the plan, saying they fear it will expose them to the virus and that it is indicative of double standards on the part of the US. “Everybody should be quarantined in their home country. We shouldn’t allow foreigners to bring us diseases,” said Charles Mathenge, a taxi driver who lives near Laikipia Air Base, the proposed site in Nanyuki, 120 miles from the capital, Nairobi. “Kenya is our country, and we should be careful with it.” There has been rising nationwide anger in recent days. Two people were killed during a protest in the town on Monday. David Mulinge, a souvenir seller, said: “What’s shocking is that the Americans don’t want their infected fellow citizens to step into their own country but to come to Kenya. That’s like treating us as lesser beings.” Health officials in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo are battling to contain an outbreak of the virus. The outbreak was declared on 15 May, but the virus is thought to have been circulating undetected for weeks before then. The epidemic, which the World Health Organization (WHO) has declared a public health emergency of international concern, is caused by the rare Bundibugyo virus, which has no vaccine or approved treatment. So far, there have been 60 deaths and 344 confirmed cases in the DRC, and one death and nine confirmed cases in Uganda, the WHO said on ‌Tuesday. There are no known cases in Kenya. The US government plans to send 30 medical personnel to staff the Nanyuki facility, which, if completed, will have 50 beds. In previous Ebola outbreaks, the US has returned affected citizens home for medical treatment. The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, said on 28 May that the US must keep potential Ebola patients out of the country. “We cannot and will not allow any cases of Ebola to enter the United States,” he said at a cabinet meeting. Last month, an American doctor who contracted Ebola in the DRC was flown to Germany for care, with his wife and four children. The proposal has caused outrage in Kenya. In a statement published last week, Dr Davji Atellah from the Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union said the group would not “sit back and watch Kenya be treated as a containment colony”. “If it is too dangerous for America, it is too dangerous for Kenya,” he said. After a petition by the Kenyan nonprofit Katiba Institute, the Nairobi high court last week temporarily blocked the establishment of the facility and the admission into the country of people exposed to Ebola. The organisation said an arrangement between the Kenyan and US governments over the facility raised serious concerns about public health, governance and sovereignty. Jeremy Lewin, the US Under Secretary for Foreign Assistance, Humanitarian Affairs, and Religious Freedom, said the US government was in touch with Kenyan authorities and was optimistic about resolving the issue. On Tuesday, Kenya’s president, William Ruto, defended the plan, saying it was being politicised and that it was part of a broader system for national health preparedness. “These measures are intended solely to safeguard public health and strengthen our capacity to respond effectively to health emergencies,” he said. But the high court judge Patricia Nyaundi later barred the Kenyan government from proceeding with the plan before the case is resolved. She also ordered the government to disclose all agreements related to the facility within seven days. The next hearing is due on 23 June. In Nanyuki, an agricultural hub of more than 70,000 people that sits almost directly on the equator and hosts a British army training unit, conversations about the planned quarantine facility are taking place among concerned people in shops, markets, homes and elsewhere. Simon Ong’ono, a motorcycle taxi rider, questioned why the US, which has more advanced healthcare infrastructure and resources than Kenya, wanted to bring Americans exposed to Ebola to the town. “President Ruto should completely abandon this plan and close our borders to patients from other countries,” he added. Mulinge said he was concerned about the potential for the virus to spread quickly in Nanyuki, where he said people engage in a lot of physical contact in businesses and social settings. “We’re very scared about contracting the disease,” he said. Fauzia Isiche, a street food seller, said she feared the return of a curfew or lockdown like during the Covid-19 pandemic if Ebola spread to the community, and said it would disrupt her business and make her unable to provide for her child. “We’d die in our houses,” she said. The airbase hosts a primary and a secondary school, and many people are worried that a spread of the disease would affect students. “My grandchildren [are] there daily,” said Mathenge. “We don’t want a problem.” Purity Kendi, a business person who lives and works near the airbase, said she felt betrayed by the Kenyan government. “We expect our leaders to protect us but they’ve showed us that they don’t care about us,” she said. She urged Kenyans across the country to unite and oppose the plan. “We don’t have another country to run to,” she said.

Israel strikes southern Lebanon despite Trump’s effort to shore up ceasefire

Israeli warplanes have launched dozens of strikes across southern Lebanon despite a new agreement supposedly brokered by Donald Trump aiming to bolster the tattered ceasefire in Lebanon. The US president said on Monday that he had stopped an imminent Israeli strike on Beirut and that he had spoken to Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and representatives of Hezbollah and both agreed that “all shooting will stop”. But on Tuesday, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency reported 30 Israeli strikes across the south. Near the city of Sidon, rescuers recovered the bodies of six members of the same family, including two children and a woman, after an Israeli strike. The Israeli military also issued a new evacuation warning for the southern city of Nabatiyeh before new strikes, accusing the “Hezbollah terror organisation” of violating the ceasefire. A deal to reduce or stop levels of violence between Israel and Hezbollah, a militant Islamist movement with close links to Tehran, would support Washington’s efforts to reach a new ceasefire agreement with Iran. Trump on Tuesday denied reports from semi-official news agencies in Iran that Tehran had paused negotiations until Israel stopped its offensive in Lebanon. “The conversations between us have been going on continuously, including four days ago, three days ago, two days ago, one day ago, and today,” he said in a social media post. Hezbollah has not claimed any recent strikes in Israel, saying instead it attacked Israeli troops who have pushed into Lebanon to establish a security zone between 5 and 10 kilometres wide. The Israeli military said on Tuesday it intercepted two projectiles fired overnight from Lebanon towards the northern city of Safed, while a drone struck a military position in western Galilee, close to the border with Lebanon, the Times of Israel newspaper reported. No injuries were reported. This most recent round of conflict in Lebanon began when Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel on 2 March in retaliation for its killing of Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in a wave of airstrikes carried out on the first day of the US-Israeli offensive against Iran. In recent days there has been a dramatic intensification in fighting and bombardment. Over the weekend, Israeli troops raised their flag over Beaufort Castle, marking their deepest incursion into southern Lebanon since the end of the 1982 to 2000 occupation. Hezbollah responded with even deeper rocket attacks into northern Israel. Citing what he called Hezbollah’s “repeated violations” of a ceasefire officially in place since 17 April but never respected by either side, Netanyahu had ordered strikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs, a densely populated Hezbollah stronghold. According to the US news outlet Axios, however, Trump called Netanyahu “fucking crazy” and accused him of putting peace talks with Iran at risk. Channel 12, a prominent independent Israeli news network, contested the details of the call. Amit Segal, the network’s chief political analyst who is close to Netanyahu’s political circles, said Trump had not attacked the Israeli prime minister personally and that the two had come to an agreement that Netanyahu would refrain from attacking the Beirut suburbs if Hezbollah ceased its attacks on Israel. Netanyahu and his defence minister, Israel Katz, said they had given instructions to strike “terrorist targets” in the southern suburbs for what they described as “repeated and ongoing violations of the ceasefire by Hezbollah”. The bombing order marked the most serious escalation of Israel’s war in Lebanon since the supposed ceasefire and was followed by Iran’s political leadership calling off all further negotiations, maintaining that a ceasefire in Lebanon was a precondition for a broader truce with the US. Katz said Washington “endorsed” the principle that his country would strike Beirut’s southern suburbs if Hezbollah launched any further attacks on Israel. “If Israeli towns continue to be attacked, we will evacuate and strike the Shia Dahiyeh quarter in Beirut, Hezbollah’s stronghold,” Katz said. In the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, which many residents had fled the day before, many shops were closed on Tuesday, while a military drone flew over the area at low altitude, according to an Agence France-Presse journalist. Layla Shehab, 35, decided to return as “we found the situation has calmed down a bit”. Lebanese and Israeli delegations have begun a new round of talks in Washington, the fourth between the two countries, which have no diplomatic relations, since the start of the war. Mahmoud Qmati, a senior Hezbollah official, told AFP on Tuesday that the group “will not accept a partial ceasefire”. “The Zionist enemy should know that any aggression against the [southern] suburbs [of Beirut] could lead to a deeper and stronger response” from the group, he added. Since mid-March, Trump has repeatedly said he is close to a deal with Tehran, which would postpone the most difficult and sensitive issues including the future of Iran’s nuclear programme. A priority for Trump is to reopen the strait of Hormuz, the critical waterway whose closure caused oil prices to spike, inflicting economic pain far beyond the region.

Sheinbaum tells US envoy to keep out of Mexican politics after drug-trade post

Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, on Tuesday appeared to chide Ron Johnson, the US ambassador, for interfering in the country’s politics amid rising tensions between her country and Washington over efforts to tackle drug trafficking. “It is also very important, and I say this respectfully, to remember that ambassadors should focus on coordination and collaboration,” Sheinbaum said during her regular morning news conference. “Ambassadors must respect the internal political affairs of their countries.” The president’s comments came after a post on X, in which Johnson seemed to imply that Mexico was making the effort to combat drugs into a political issue, after Sheinbaum herself had accused the US of intervening in domestic issues. “Every moment spent turning this shared security challenge into a political dispute is a missed opportunity to strengthen our partnership and protect the people we serve,” Johnson wrote. The back-and-forth between Johnson and Sheinbaum is the latest sign of increasing tensions between the two neighbouring countries, which have been rising for months over efforts to combat drug-trafficking groups. Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to send ground troops into Mexico to fight the cartels, and has also accused Mexican politicians of having an “intolerable alliance” with organized crime. Throughout, Sheinbaum has kept what she herself has called a “cool head”, politely declining Trump’s offers to deploy US troops and acquiescing to his demands: ordering thousands of troops to the US border to halt migration, stopping oil shipments to Cuba, and sending nearly 100 cartel members to face justice in the US. But relations began fraying in April after it was revealed that several CIA agents had been involved in a raid on a drug lab in Chihuahua state, without knowledge or approval from the federal government – a potential violation of Mexico’s constitution. Just over a week later, the US justice department announced drug trafficking charges against the governor of the Sinaloa state and nine other current and former officials, accusing them of having ties to the powerful Sinaloa cartel. The governor, Rubén Rocha Moya, is a member of Sheinbaum’s own Morena party, and was a close ally of her mentor and predecessor Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Since the indictment, tensions between the two countries have reached boiling point, with Sheinbaum refusing to hand the governor over to US authorities until Washington provides more evidence against him. Media reports also suggested that Rocha’s indictment would be the first of many, and that the CIA had expanded its on-the-ground efforts in Mexico. Last week, Mexico’s congress approved a bill from Sheinbaum, amending the constitution to make ‘foreign interference’ grounds to annul election results. On Sunday, Sheinbaum openly voiced her anger at the indictment. “An incident of this magnitude is unprecedented in our bilateral relations,” she said during a rally. “Is this really a legitimate, genuine interest in helping Mexico? Or are we perhaps seeing sectors of the US far right positioning themselves ahead of their 2026 elections? Or do they intend to influence the 2027 election in our country?”

New Danish government vows to resist Greenland pressure and tackle cost of living

Denmark’s new left-leaning government has pledged to keep pushing back against US pressure over Greenland and address the cost of living crisis, with measures including halving VAT on food and offering free public transport to young people. “We present a government that will help improve the everyday lives of Danes,” Mette Frederiksen, who will return for a third consecutive term as prime minister at the head of the four-party minority coalition, said on Tuesday. “We want to provide targeted support to those Danes who have been hit hard by rising petrol and diesel prices,” the prime minister said, adding that the measures were “concrete” and “reflect the way we want to be as a government”. Announced late on Monday, the agreement between Frederiksen’s Social Democrats, the Social Liberals, the Green Left and the centrist Moderates ended two months of uncertainty after March elections in which 12 parties won seats in parliament. The new government coalition marks a shift to the left for the 48-year-old prime minister, who for the past four years has headed an unlikely left-right alliance. With only 82 of the 179 seats in parliament, it will rely mainly on the support of the left-wing Red-Green Alliance for a parliamentary majority. The government’s immediate priorities include ongoing diplomatic talks with the US and Nato over Greenland, a Danish near-autonomous territory that Donald Trump has insisted Washington needs to control for national security reasons. “The government will stand firm on the kingdom’s sovereignty, territorial integrity and right to self-determination,” the programme said. Denmark’s military will be further expanded amid concerns about US commitment to European security. To secure the support of the Red-Green Alliance and other left-leaning parties, however, Frederiksen has also undertaken to provide free dental care for Danes within 10 years as well as free public transport for everyone under the age of 22. VAT on food will be halved, and removed altogether on fruit and vegetables, while less well-off pensioners will receive an extra DKr1,000 (£115) a month. The programme does not include a wealth tax, which Frederiksen proposed during the campaign but which was roundly criticised by business leaders including the chief executive of Lego and the chair of the board of directors of Maersk. The measures seek to address a cost of living crisis that haunted Frederiksen in the run-up to the 24 March election, in which the Social Democrats – traditionally the country’s largest party – finished first but recorded their lowest score since 1903. Lars Løkke Rasmussen, the outgoing foreign minister and Moderates leader, said the new government was aiming for “redistribution based on solidarity” and “guarantees a steady hand on the tiller in the turbulent times we live in”. Frederiksen said her incoming administration would stand firm on Denmark’s hardline immigration policy. “That is absolutely crucial for the cohesion of our society, and therefore we want to deport more foreign criminals,” she told reporters. She added that the government would continue working on establishing reception centres outside the EU – heavily criticised by rights groups – where asylum seekers would be housed while their requests were processed. After public anger over Denmark’s booming and heavily polluting pig farming industry, accused of animal cruelty during the campaign, other measures included a ban on extreme breeding practices, a move towards bigger stalls and an end to automatic tail-docking. A government commission involving all interested parties, including the government, NGOs and farmers’ organisations and local municipalities, will be established in an effort to “comprehensively restructure” the sector, Frederiksen said. Born into a working-class family of longstanding Social Democrats, the daughter of a typographer and a preschool teacher, Frederiksen entered parliament in 2001 aged 24 and took over as leader of the Social Democrats in 2015. She has radically tightened Denmark’s migration policy in an effort to slow rising support for the far right, while advocating stronger international commitments including staunch support for Ukraine and a big hike in national defence spending. The new coalition was formed at the third attempt after Frederiksen failed to cobble together a left-leaning alliance straight after the election and Troels Lund Poulsen of the liberal Venstre party also fell short in his efforts to form a right-wing alliance. The coalition talks were the longest in Denmark’s history and analysts have said the evident difficulty in forming the government, as well as a series of scandals that have weakened Frederiksen since she became prime minister in 2019, may mean it does not survive its full term.

Kirpans and UK knife law: what are the rules?

The conviction of Vickrum Digwa for the murder of 18-year-old Henry Nowak has sparked renewed discussion about kirpans, the ceremonial blades carried by some Sikhs as an article of faith. The prosecution told the jury at Southampton crown court that while Digwa was wearing a small kirpan under his clothing around his neck, which met his religious obligation, he also chose to carry the much larger knife. What is a kirpan? A kirpan is a ceremonial sword or dagger that is one of the five articles of faith for practising Sikhs, known as the five Ks, because they all begin with the letter K in Punjabi. The other four are kesh: keeping uncut hair, which is maintained in a turban; kara, a round steel bracelet; kanga, a small wooden comb; and kachera, cotton shorts. The word kirpan comes from two words: kirpa, meaning grace, and aan, meaning defence. Kirpans are typically worn close to the body and are often small, with a curved blade. Sikh organisations describe the kirpan as an article of faith that symbolises dignity and a duty to stand against injustice and protect the vulnerable. What does the law say? Under UK law a person can possess a kirpan for religious, ceremonial, sporting or historical reasons. But, like any bladed article, a kirpan can become an offensive weapon if it is used unlawfully. The government says it is up to a court to decide if a person has a good reason to carry a knife or a weapon if they are charged with carrying it illegally. What happened in this case? The CPS said Digwa carried two ceremonial blades, describing both as kirpans, and said the judge, who described the weapon Digwa was carrying as a “large Sikh dagger”, accepted that assessment. But leaders of the Sikh community, who have unanimously condemned the murder, said the blade used by Digwa was not a kirpan, while the Sikh Press Association said plans were under way to ensure every initiated Sikh in the UK would be addressed directly regarding kirpan rules and responsibilities. Are there calls for it to be banned? The police and crime commissioner for Hampshire is leading calls for a review of religious exemptions on the carrying of knives after the murder. Donna Jones described the stabbing of the university student as a “national tragedy” and said she was writing to the prime minister, Keir Starmer, about the issue. But Reform UK has said the kirpan should be banned. What has been the response by political leaders? The Reform UK leader, Nigel Farage, has been widely condemned for calling for “pure cold rage” over the case. “An accusation of a racial slur was treated more seriously than an act of murder,” Farage said. The home secretary, Shabana Mahmood, has warned of a “dangerous undercurrent” after the murder of Henry Nowak. Speaking in the Commons, Mahmood said one officer had already been misidentified and had had to move out of his home to protect himself and his family after receiving death threats. What has been the response from the British Sikh community? Sikh organisations have strongly condemned the killing. In a joint statement, Sikh groups said: “This isn’t representative of the Sikh community. This was one man.” They warned that the wider Sikh community had faced abuse in the aftermath. Community leaders in the UK have stated that Digwa’s actions should not be taken as representative of Sikh beliefs or practices. The murder comes amid longstanding anxieties within the Sikh community across the country. According to the British Sikh Report 2025 released in January, 49% of surveyed Sikhs said they were worried about rising anti-Sikh sentiment, while 50% were concerned misinformation on social media could cause hostility towards Sikhs.

Rubio says Iran ready to discuss nuclear deal as Tehran declares peace talks over

Iran has agreed to negotiate aspects of its nuclear program that it had refused to discuss even a month ago, the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, has claimed, even as Tehran announced it was halting peace talks and moving to fully close the strait of Hormuz. Appearing before the Senate foreign relations committee for the first time since the Trump administration launched the war against Iran – which was pitched as a short, weeks-long war, in February – Rubio repeated the Trump administration’s claims that a deal was within reach. He arrived on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, the morning after Iran’s state-affiliated Tasnim News Agency reported that Tehran would stop exchanging messages with Washington through intermediaries, pointing to Israel’s military operations in Lebanon as a ceasefire violation. Donald Trump later claimed conversations “have been going on continuously” and insisted it was false to suggest officials had stopped speaking. And Rubio insisted progress could be made soon. “There is the prospect before us, which could happen today, it could happen tomorrow, it could happen next week – that for the first time, certainly in my memory, they have agreed to negotiate aspects of their nuclear program that just a month ago” they said they would not, he told senators. Rubio also claimed that Mojtaba Khamenei – who succeeded his father Ali Khamenei after the supreme leader was killed in the opening US-Israeli strikes on 28 February, and has not been seen in public since assuming office – was alive, and more involved in the regime’s efforts. “I think there are indications out there that he is increasingly engaging at some level,” he said. On the military picture, Rubio suggested that Iran’s missile program had been “substantially degraded”, its launcher capacity reduced, and its drone-building capability “eroded”. “There is no Iranian navy,” he said. “It lies at the bottom of the ocean, and will soon, within a number of years, be prime fishing spots, because they’ll turn into reefs.” Rubio conceded the regime still has “a lot of drones”, however. “Because these are easy to make,” he said . “This is a pervasive problem around the world.” Such claims about the vast destruction of Iranian’s military capabilities have been contested. The New York Times reported in May that Iran had retained roughly 70% of its prewar missile stockpile, though analysts noted the more significant damage may be to Iran’s ability to replace them, with over 85% of Iran’s ballistic missile, drone and naval defense industrial base damaged, or destroyed. Rubio laid out a two-phase framework in more granular terms than the administration had previously offered publicly. Reopening the strait of Hormuz – with Iran announcing clearly it was not charging tolls, helping remove the mines it placed there, and committing not to fire on ships – was a precondition for any talks, not a bargaining chip. “That’s the predicate that opens the door to phase two,” he said. Phase two would require Iran to commit to disposing of its stockpile of highly enriched uranium and to negotiate “severe and long-term limitations, and or cancellation of enrichment activity”. In an exchange with the Democratic US senator for Connecticut Chris Murphy, Rubio ruled out offering sanctions relief simply to reopen the vital waterway, which has been all but closed since the start of the war. “Any sanctions relief is condition-based,” he said, and was tied to Iran’s nuclear program, the long-held basis for the sanctions. “That’s not been discussed, that’s not been offered.” The ceasefire agreed in April had included an Iranian commitment to reopen the strait. Trump later said Iran had “knowingly failed” to honor that pledge, and on 13 April the US launched a counter-blockade targeting all ships seeking to reach Iranian ports. Rubio told senators on Tuesday that the blockade was costing Tehran “hundreds of millions of dollars a day” in lost oil revenue. “If they’re going to shut down the straits for everybody,” he said, “we’re going to shut down the straits for them”.