Georgia arrests two in $3-million uranium smuggling plot

“Our forces are fully prepared to resume combat from exactly where it stopped,” said Major General Mohammad Pakpour, commander-in-chief of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), during a meeting in Tehran with Major General Amir Hatami, commander-in-chief of Iran’s army.

“The aggressors will not be spared,” he added. “The will and resolve of the Iranian people and our armed forces have triumphed. We stand together.”

Earlier in the day, a senior Iranian lawmaker also warned that Iran would respond to any future Israeli attack with a blow more severe than last month’s conflict.

“If the Zionist regime again makes the mistake of acting against the Islamic Republic, it will be hit even harder than it was in Operation True Promise 3,” Esmail Kowsari, a member of parliament’s national security and foreign policy committee, told reporters i Tehran.

Hatami said Iran would not wait for external threats to materialize. Last week, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that the war with Iran "is not over".

“The Zionist regime is a danger to regional and global peace,” Hatami said. “If given the opportunity, it would strike others in the region. We will not allow it.”

The commanders’ statements came amid Israel’s airstrikes on Damascus. Israel wants a demilitarised buffer zone in southern Syria.

US President Donald Trump expects Iran to return to nuclear negotiations, saying that diplomacy is in Tehran's best interest, according to the State Department Spokeswoman Tammy Bruce.

“I know that he expects them to begin to negotiate because that's in their best interest,” Bruce said in an interview with Fox News. “He has believed and continues to believe that diplomacy will work here."

Trump has warned that if Iran's nuclear program continues to pose a threat, he would "absolutely" consider more strikes, "without a question".

Iran maintains its nuclear program is peaceful.

“I know that he expects them to begin to negotiate because that's in their best interest,” Bruce said in an interview with Fox News. “He has believed and continues to believe that diplomacy will work here."

Bruce said the US negotiating position has remained consistent throughout, adding, “To negotiate…has been our posture from the start as indicated and led by President Trump.”

The Iranians know what our posture is, she said adding that Trump has shown patience and generosity even in the wake of recent hostilities.

“The fact of the matter is they should be very grateful that President Trump is as generous of a man as he is because of the nature of what's going on in the Middle East,” Bruce said.

Bruce’s comments came the same day independent journalist Laura Rozen reported on X that a senior US official told a source there was “no prospect for the resumption of US-Iran negotiations anytime soon.”

Iranian officials dig in

On Wednesday, Iran’s parliament said negotiations should not resume until preconditions are met, according to a statement carried by state media.

“When the US use negotiations as a tool to deceive Iran and cover up a sudden military attack by the Zionist regime (Israel), talks cannot be conducted as before. Preconditions must be set and no new negotiations can take place until they are fully met,” it said.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has previously demanded guarantees against further military attacks.

Last month, Israeli and US forces struck multiple nuclear facilities in Iran, citing concerns over a weapons program.

Iran maintains that its nuclear work is civilian in nature.

Tehran and Washington had conducted five rounds of indirect negotiations through Omani mediation prior to the June strikes, which brought talks to a halt. US demands that Iran cease uranium enrichment but the Iranian officials have repeatedly rejected it.

European pressure builds

Despite Trump’s insistence he is “in no rush” for a deal, the US and three European governments have agreed to push for an agreement by the end of August. If no progress is made, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said Paris, London and Berlin will trigger the UN sanctions snapback mechanism.

The snapback mechanism is part of UN Security Council Resolution 2231, which endorsed the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA. It allows any participant in the nuclear agreement to reimpose sanctions if Iran is deemed non-compliant. If no resolution to maintain sanctions relief is passed within 30 days, all previous UN measures return automatically.

Revolutionary Guards-affiliated Fars News reported Wednesday that Iran’s Ministry of Communications sent the complaint in a letter dated June 23 to the ITU’s Radio Regulations Board.

The report included a copy of the letter, which alleges that Starlink operated in Iran without the required license.

The complaint follows Starlink’s activation in Iran during the 12-day war with Israel last month, when Iranian authorities imposed widespread internet shutdowns.

On June 14, Starlink’s founder Elon Musk confirmed on X that “the beams are on,” indicating the satellite service was active inside Iran.

Starlink's role in Iran has grown significantly over recent years. The number of its users in the country has now surpassed 100,000, according to Pouya Pirhosseinlou, head of the Internet and Infrastructure Committee at Iran’s E-Commerce Association.

"Over 30,000 unique users are utilizing satellite internet, suggesting that the total number of satellite internet users exceeds 100,000," Pirhosseinlou told Iran's ILNA news agency earlier this year.

Despite being officially prohibited in Iran, Starlink’s appeal lies in its unrestricted access and high-speed service—an alternative to the heavily filtered and controlled local internet where Iran ranks among the world's lowest for internet freedom, according to Freedom House.

Last weekend, Iran's judiciary spokesman Asghar Jahangir said authorities would take legal action against individuals and entities using Starlink.

According to a new proposed espionage-related bill, penalties ranging from six months to 10 years would apply to the use or distribution of unauthorized communication equipment, including satellite internet services like Starlink, depending on scale and intent.

"On July 1… agents located a minivan occupied by five citizens of Iran and two citizens of Uzbekistan," CBP's Swanton Sector said in a statement as reported by Fox News. "They are currently detained and pending removal proceedings."

All seven men had previously been apprehended for unlawful entry into the US, CBP said. The arrest occurred near the Champlain Station, a border patrol unit operating in a rural stretch of northern New York, near the Canadian border.

Fox News Digital highlighted renewed warnings earlier this month from former FBI special agent Jonathan Gilliam, who suggested Iranian-linked operatives may already be embedded in the US. “Where these sleeper cells may be is in plain sight,” Gilliam said. “And that's the real terrifying part.”

This comes as the US airstrikes in June targeted Iranian nuclear infrastructure and there are growing concerns around individuals tied to Iran entering Western countries under unclear pretenses.

In recent weeks, Iranian hardliners and clerics have repeatedly threatened to kill US President Donald Trump.

A December 2023 US State Department report documented plots by Iranian operatives in the US and Europe, including a foiled assassination attempt in New York and attempts to collect information for terrorist purposes on the London-based Iran International.

Other European states—including Albania, Belgium, Denmark, and the Netherlands—have taken actions in recent years against Iranian-linked actors accused of involvement in similar schemes.

“We are increasingly seeing these three states ... undertaking threat-to-life operations in the United Kingdom,” said Dominic Murphy, who heads London’s Counter Terrorism Command.

Iran, Murphy told reporters, continues “to try and sow violence on the streets of the United Kingdom ... They too are to some extent relying on criminal proxies to do that.”

Vicki Evans, the UK’s Senior National Coordinator for Counter Terrorism Policing, said proxies were typically criminals acting “quite often for small amounts of cash,” but also included vulnerable individuals such as disgruntled teenagers.

“We are concerned that they might find themselves in an online environment where they're encouraged or egged on to do something and don't understand what they're being asked to do,” Evans said.

Last week, the UK Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) released a report warning that Iran poses one of the gravest state-based threats to British national security, on par with adversaries like Russia and China.

The report highlighted Tehran’s increased willingness to carry out assassinations, espionage, and cyberattacks within the United Kingdom, and calls for a fundamental shift in British strategy toward the Islamic Republic.

Since January 2022, there have been at least 15 attempts at murder or kidnap against British nationals or UK-based individuals, according to the report.