Iran foreign minister, parliament speaker to attend Nasrallah funeral
People pass a banner near Camille Chamoun Sports City Stadium during preparations for the funeral of former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah who was killed in Israeli airstrikes last year in Beirut, Lebanon February 22, 2025.
Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi and parliament speaker Mohammed Bagher Ghalibaf are due to attend the funeral of slain Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut on Sunday.
His assassination by Israel last year marked an epochal setback to Tehran and its network of armed allies in the Middle East.
Ghalibaf secured attendance after personal follow-ups and an official invitation from Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, IRGC-affiliated Fars News reported Saturday.
The outlet also said Lebanese authorities did not extend an official invitation to Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian..
Additionally, Fars noted that religious and Islamic jurisprudential considerations, specifically the obligation to expedite burial after a temporary interment, prevented the funeral from being held in Iran.
Lebanese authorities recently blocked Iranian flights from landing in Beirut, citing security risks and warnings from the US that Israel might target incoming Iranian planes. According to AFP, Israel had informed Lebanon via Washington that it would consider an Iranian flight landing in Beirut as a military escalation, alleging that Hezbollah uses civilian flights to transfer weapons and funds from Iran.
The flight restrictions have prevented a larger Iranian delegation and citizens from attending the funeral, according to Iranian media.
Nasrallah’s burial, five months after his assassination by Israel, will take place at Beirut’s Camille Chamoun Sports City Stadium and also honor Hashem Safi al-Din, who briefly led Hezbollah before being assassinated by Israel.
Once Iran’s most powerful regional proxy armed militia, Hezbollah was founded with the support of the Revolutionary Guards in 1982 but suffered heavy losses in last year’s war, with Israel significantly weakening its military and political power. While Tehran remains its key backer, the group’s diminished strength has raised questions about its ability to project power as it once did.
Earlier this month, US envoy Morgan Ortagus declared that Hezbollah’s “reign of terror” was over, crediting US pressure on Iran for the group’s decline. After meeting Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, she warned that Hezbollah’s involvement in the new government crosses a US “red line.”
As the group prepares for its leader’s funeral, it faces mounting challenges both militarily and politically.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will visit Iran this week to discuss bilateral relations, as well as regional and international developments, Iran's foreign ministry announced on Saturday.
Iranian domestic media specifically mentioned Tuesday as the expected date of the visit, with a focus on discussions about Syria. No further details have yet emerged regarding the nature of the visit, as stopping Iran's nuclear program is a top priority for President Donald Trump.
While the Trump administration has engaged in talks with Moscow to end the war in Ukraine, it has taken a hardline approach toward Iran, demanding a reversal of Tehran's nuclear, military, and regional policies.
Meanwhile, the US has suggested that Washington and Moscow might share a strategic interest in preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Speaking to independent journalist Catherine Herridge, Senator Marco Rubio said Thursday, “There are things we could cooperate on geopolitically,” adding, “I’m not sure the Russians are fans of the Iranian regime having nuclear weapons.”
His remarks come as US and Russian officials held their first discussions in Saudi Arabia on ending a three-year conflict this week.
While Iran has close ties and military cooperation with Moscow under Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s “Look East” policy, some Iranian media have warned that Russia may not be a reliable partner and could shift its stance depending on its geopolitical priorities.
Security forces arrested Iranian rapper Arash Seyedi, known as Eycin and his producer Rasam Sohrabi during a live underground performance at a cafe in western Tehran on Thursday, eyewitnesses told Iran International.
“He had a performance at a café in western Tehran in Janatabad when plainclothes officers and the police arrived, arrested him and his composer, and detained several people there,” one source said, requesting to remain anonymous for security reasons.
A video obtained by Iran International shows the moment the officers storm the venue and detain the underground rapper. A masked man can be seen in the footage, who the source said was one of those who detained Eycin.
“They came with a van and took everyone away. The venue was also sealed off,” the source added, "Eycin had scheduled several performances in cafes, on a tour, in Qeshm in recent weeks."
The fans were later released but two sources told Iran International that Eycin and his composer remained in detention.
A source said that both Eysin and Sohrabi appeared in court on Friday morning, however the charges against them remain unknown.
An image of duo surfaced on Iranian rap Telegram channels on Friday evening, showing them handcuffed.
“Lately, rappers have been organizing a lot of underground performances through various methods. It seems like they want to crack down before it spreads,” the source said.
International human rights organizations have condemned Iran's suppression of artistic expression in recent years.
In the aftermath of Iran's nationwide protests sparked by the death in custody of Mahsa Amini in September 2022, at least two rappers - Toomaj Salehi and Saman Yasin - were sentenced to death in connection with their music. Following an international outcry, their death sentences were revoked.
A man charged with stabbing Salman Rushdie was found guilty of attempted murder by a New York court on Friday, in the latest twist to a decades-long ordeal for the famous novelist menaced by an Iranian death warrant.
The trial began this month of Hadi Matar in the 2022 attack on Rushdie, the irreverent author whose death was called for by Islamic Republic founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in an infamous fatwa, or Islamic decree.
Matar, a 27-year-old American of Lebanese Shi'ite extraction, had pleaded not guilty to second-degree attempted murder and assault.
Rushdie was among the first to testify, calmly describing the assault and removing spectacles blacked out in one lens to reveal his wounded eye.
Jurors in the Mayville, New York courtroom heard how the knife attack at a New York lecture unfolded in a matter of seconds, leaving Rushdie half blind and fighting for his life in hospital.
Moments before 77-year-old Rushdie was stabbed on stage, a poet was introducing the book event on the topic of keeping writers safe from harm.
The defendant was accused of running on stage and stabbing Rushdie up to 10 times. The attack also damaged Rushdie’s liver and paralyzed one hand.
Matar's lawyers had argued prosecutors had not proved his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
In July 2024, two years after the incident, an unsealed indictment charged the defendant with providing material support to Iran-backed Hezbollah sometime between September 2022 and August 2022.
The indictment did not specify how Matar is linked to the group and his trial is due to be held separately in Buffalo, New York.
Rushdie is an atheist born in India to a Muslim Kashmiri family. He was forced to spend about 10 years in hiding throughout the United Kingdom and United States for much of the 1990s after Khomeini's fatwa.
Khomeini had called in 1988 on “the proud Muslim people of the world” to kill the author of “The Satanic Verses,” which centered on the life of the Prophet Mohammad.
Hundreds of prominent filmmakers including top global celebrities have signed an open letter demanding Iranian authorities drop propaganda and obscenity charges against the two directors of recent film "My Favorite Cake".
The independent film about a widow's quest for companionship defied strict censorship laws in Iran to gain international acclaim, sparking outcry over the persecution of its creators.
The petition launched on Change.org calls for the immediate and unconditional dismissal of charges against the two filmmakers Maryam Moghaddam and Behtash Sanaeeha, who face trial in Tehran’s revolutionary court on March 1.
The charges include propaganda against the system, producing and distributing a film with obscene content, violating public morality and decency, and screening the film without a distribution license.
The petition has garnered widespread support from the global film community, with signatories including Pedro Almodóvar, Juliette Binoche, Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Jafar Panahi, Mohammad Rasoulof, Agnieszka Holland, Joachim Trier, Céline Sciamma, Arthur Harari, Dominik Moll and the directors of the Venice, Berlin, and Rotterdam film festivals.
The statement signed by the filmmakers condemns the prosecution of Moghaddam and Sanaeeha, describing it as part of a broader crackdown on artistic expression in Iran.
It highlights that the directors have faced "months of interrogation and two years of continuous travel bans" for making the film, which portrays the life of a middle-aged woman in Tehran struggling with loneliness and societal expectations.
The film, which received critical acclaim internationally, screened in competition at the 2023 Berlin Film Festival, winning the FIPRESCI Jury Award, and later received the Silver Hugo at the Chicago Film Festival.
US President Donald Trump's administration is pressuring Iraq to allow Kurdish oil exports to restart to help offset a potential fall in Iranian oil exports, Reuters reported citing eight sources with direct knowledge of the matter.
Trump this month reinstated the so-called "maximum pressure" campaign on Iran from his first term, with the stated aim of driving its oil sales to zero.
Iraq’s oil minister announced on Monday that exports from the Kurdistan region would resume next week.
Sources cited by Reuters said Trump’s administration was a key driver behind the announcement.
Reuters cited two US administration officials confirming that the US had asked the Iraqi government to resume Kurdish exports. One of them said the move would help dampen upward pressure on oil prices, the report added.
"It's not only important for regional security that our Kurdish partners be allowed to export their own oil but also help keep the price of gas low," Reuters cited a White House official as saying.
Iran has been a major recipient of cut-price Kurdish oil. Last July, a Reuters report detailed how the closure of the pipeline transporting Kurdish crude to Turkey in 2023 led to an increase in oil smuggling to Iran, with an estimated 200,000 barrels per day being transported by truck.
In December 2024, Reuters also reported on a fuel oil smuggling network generating at least $1 billion annually for Iran and its proxies, which had flourished in Iraq since Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani took office in 2022.
The US aims to cut this supply route as part of Trump's maximum pressure campaign, the report said.
"Washington is pressuring Baghdad to ensure Kurdish crude is exported to global markets through Turkey rather than being sold cheaply to Iran," Reuters cited an Iraqi oil official with knowledge of the crude trucking shipments crossing to Iran as saying.
Turkey’s Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar told Reuters that Turkey has not yet received any official notification from Iraq regarding the resumption of oil flows.