Trump pledges U.S. military support to protect Qatar
U.S. President Donald Trump has signed an executive order pledging U.S. military support to defend Qatar if it comes under attack, following last mont...
Iran has officially confirmed the arrest of 18-year-old Franco-German cyclist Lennart Monterlos, after he was reported to be missing since mid-June.
"He was arrested for committing a crime, and an official notification regarding his situation was sent to the French embassy," Abbas Araghchi told French daily newspaper Le Monde, without providing further details.
France's foreign ministry said it was in contact with Iranian authorities and the family of Lennart Monterlos. The French ministry said it would give no further comment, as his safety was at stake.
Monterlos was undertaking a solo Europe-to-Asia biking expedition and had last made contact on 16th June. Prior to his disappearance, he had been documenting his journey on Instagram and had expressed optimism about his experiences in Iran, despite concerns from family and friends about the risks of travelling through the country.
Reuters reported that the arrest is likely to worsen already strained ties between Paris and Tehran.
Iran has already been holding two other French citizens, Jacques Paris and Cecile Kohler, for more than three years in conditions France has said are akin to torture.
France has called their detention state-sponsored hostage taking and demanded they be released immediately.
Earlier on Thursday, France's foreign ministry spokesperson Christophe Lemoine said Paris was trying to get permission to visit them.
The pair were moved from Tehran's Evin prison following airstrikes by Israel that targeted the prison in June. French consular officials visited them at a new location on July 1, but no longer knew where they were being held now, he said.
Kohler's sister on Sunday said that the two had been moved from Evin prison in Tehran after Israel bombed the site but that she had not been told where the two were now being held.
Lemoine reiterated that French nationals should not travel to Iran given the risk of arbitrary arrests.
Iran's Revolutionary Guards have detained dozens of foreign and dual nationals in recent years, often on espionage-related charges. Rights groups and Western countries accuse Tehran of using foreign detainees as bargaining chips, which it denies.
France in May filed a case at the World Court against Iran for violating the right to consular protection, in a bid to pressure Tehran over the detention of its two citizens.
A day of mourning has been declared in Portugal to pay respect to victims who lost their lives in the Lisbon Funicular crash which happened on Wednesday evening.
Video from the USGS (United States Geological Survey) showed on Friday (19 September) the Kilauea volcano in Hawaii erupting and spewing lava.
At least eight people have died and more than 90 others were injured following a catastrophic gas tanker explosion on a major highway in Mexico City’s Iztapalapa district on Wednesday, authorities confirmed.
A powerful 7.4-magnitude earthquake struck off Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula on 13 September with no tsunami threat, coming just weeks after the region endured a devastating 8.8-magnitude quake — the strongest since 1952.
Authorities in California have identified the dismembered body discovered in a Tesla registered to singer D4vd as 15-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez, who had been missing from Lake Elsinore since April 2024.
U.S. President Donald Trump has signed an executive order pledging U.S. military support to defend Qatar if it comes under attack, following last month’s Israeli airstrikes on Doha that intensified regional tensions.
Qarabağ claimed their second win in the UEFA Champions League group stage with a 2-0 victory over Copenhagen at the Tofig Bahramov Republican Stadium in Baku on Wednesday.
Contact has been lost with several vessels in the Global Sumud Flotilla, organisers said on Wednesday evening, as the ships continued their attempt to reach Gaza with humanitarian aid.
French naval personnel have boarded a Russia-linked oil tanker suspected of being used to launch drone flights that disrupted airports in Denmark last month.
The foreign minister of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) Tahsin Ertugruloglu has strongly criticised the UN Security Council, accusing it of depriving the Turkish Cypriot people for six decades through failed negotiations on the Cyprus issue.
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