Iran International
The European Association of Nuclear Medicine (EANM) has barred Iranian citizens from attending its congresses, regardless of where they live, citing European Union sanctions, according to a letter obtained by Iran International.
The letter, sent by the association's head of international customer relations and seen by Iran International, said Iranian nationals cannot be accepted because of "international sanctions and legal requirements."
"This decision is not based on personal considerations but has been taken to comply with the binding legal framework of the European Union," the letter said.
The EANM is a Europe-wide professional organization representing physicians, scientists and healthcare professionals working in nuclear medicine. It organizes one of the field's largest annual scientific congresses and promotes research, education and clinical standards in nuclear medicine.
The association said EU restrictive measures against Iran include sanctions targeting individuals and entities, adding that admitting participants who could fall under those rules could expose the organization to legal and sanctions risks.
To ensure full compliance with EU law, the letter said, registration and participation by all Iranian nationals would not be accepted, regardless of their current country of residence.
The policy makes no distinction between Iranian citizens living in Iran and those residing or holding permanent residence abroad, making Iranian nationality alone the basis for exclusion from the congress.
A Finnish supermarket group has found itself unexpectedly drawn into Ali Khamenei’s funeral ceremonies after footage from Iraq appeared to show his coffin being unloaded from a refrigerated truck carrying K-Group branding.
The scene, filmed in Karbala and circulated by Reuters, showed a large crowd surrounding a refrigerated truck marked with orange-and-white logos resembling those of Finland’s K Group, part of the retail giant Kesko. Men in dark clothing then pulled a coffin from the frosted rear compartment and carried it above the crowd.
The footage was filmed during the Iraqi leg of Khamenei’s funeral processions, which moved through Najaf and Karbala before his planned burial in Mashhad on July 9.
The image quickly drew attention in Finland, where Finnish tabloid Ilta-Sanomat described the sight as “incredible” and said Finns may have had to “rub their eyes” when they saw what looked like familiar K-Market-style branding in the middle of Khamenei’s funeral. Helsingin Sanomat, Finland’s largest daily newspaper, also reported the story.
Yle, Finland’s public broadcaster, ran the story under the headline: “Was Khamenei’s coffin pulled from a K-Group vehicle in Iraq?” It said the Reuters video showed a cold transport truck with orange coloring and repeated K letters that appeared to resemble K Group logos.
Kesko told Yle it had no information about the vehicle and had only become aware of the case through the images.
The company said its deliveries are handled by partner-owned vehicles and that Kesko does not have its own fleet. It suggested one possibility was that a transport partner had sold a vehicle onward without removing K-Group markings.
“This may be a situation where one of our transport partners failed to remove decals referring to us when selling equipment onward,” Kesko told Yle by email.
The company said it would remind transport operators that such decals must be removed before vehicles are sold.
There is no indication that Kesko or K-Market had any involvement in Khamenei’s funeral procession or that the company owned or operated the truck.
The strange visual detail stood out because of the contrast: one of the Islamic Republic’s most symbolic funeral ceremonies, a coffin kept cold after months of delayed burial, and what appeared to be the branding of a Finnish grocery chain on the vehicle carrying it through Karbala.
For just over two weeks, Iran had something it had not held in decades: a US authorization opening the way for the sale of its oil. On Tuesday, after tanker attacks near the Strait of Hormuz, Washington took it back.
The US Treasury Department revoked the June 21 general license that had allowed the production, delivery and sale of Iranian-origin crude oil and petroleum products, reversing a rare sanctions relief measure at the center of Washington’s negotiations with Tehran.
OFAC said the new license, effective July 7, allows existing transactions to be wound down until July 17 but bars new purchases or loading of Iranian-origin crude oil and petroleum products from Tuesday.
For Tehran, the 60-day license was more than a technical waiver. It briefly reopened a channel to international oil markets after decades of US pressure on Iran’s energy exports, allowing sales including to China as Washington tried to keep diplomacy alive.
The move came hours after the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) said three tankers were attacked near the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, prompting the regional maritime threat level to be raised to “severe.”
A US official said Iran’s actions in the Strait of Hormuz were “wholly unacceptable” to the United States and would be met with consequences, Reuters reported Tuesday.
Among the vessels targeted was the Qatari tanker Al Rakayat, which Doha said was attacked while transiting near the Strait of Hormuz. Qatar summoned Iran’s charge d’affaires in Doha to protest the targeting of the tanker.
In response, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei urged Qatar to “avoid any action” that would contradict the memorandum of understanding between Tehran and Washington.
Baghaei said Tuesday that under Clause 5 of the memorandum, the Islamic Republic was committed to taking the necessary measures for the future management of the Strait of Hormuz and providing maritime services.
He said some commercial vessels had used routes not coordinated with Iran while turning off or manipulating AIS tracking systems, which he said created risks of collision, environmental harm and disruption to Iran’s efforts to facilitate safe passage through the strait.
Persian Gulf states including Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates condemned the attacks, calling them a threat to international navigation, regional stability and energy supplies.
Inside Iran, Mohsen Rezaei, a former IRGC commander-in-chief and current military adviser to Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, said the United States would doom negotiations with Iran to failure.
“Those opposed to the talks should wait, because the Americans themselves will derail these negotiations,” Rezaei said Tuesday.
Nezamoldin Mousavi, an Iranian hardline politician and former head of the IRGC-affiliated Fars News Agency, wrote on X that after Washington revoked the Iran oil sanctions waiver, Iran had “no card left” except closing the Strait of Hormuz.
He urged lawmakers to approve a three-urgency bill next week to leave the NPT.
The escalation comes as the coffin of slain Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has arrived in Iraq but has yet to be buried, leaving eyes once again fixed on the Strait of Hormuz.
A German court heard that an alleged IRGC-linked operative sought a Palestinian or Somali woman in financial need to burn a Jewish kosher shop for about €4,000, as police detailed a wider plot against Jewish figures in Germany.
The testimony came Monday during the second hearing in the trial of two men accused of cooperating with the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The case is being heard in room 237 of Hamburg’s Higher Regional Court and is expected to continue through October.
Ali S., a 54-year-old Afghan-born Danish national, is the main defendant. Tawab M., a 42-year-old Afghan national, is the second defendant. Both are represented by lawyers of Iranian origin.
German prosecutors charged Ali S. in May with espionage, espionage for sabotage purposes, and attempted participation in murder and arson. Tawab M. was charged with attempted participation in murder.
In the courtroom, reporters and members of the public are separated from the judges, defendants and lawyers by a clear acrylic wall. The three-member court panel, made up of two judges and a clerk, is all female.
Volker Beck, head of the German-Israeli Society and one of the alleged targets in the case, sat in the public section, listening closely and taking notes.
Paid arson plan
A senior official from Germany’s Federal Criminal Police Office, or BKA, told the court that Ali S. had been instructed to set fire to a Jewish kosher grocery store.
According to the testimony, the attack was supposed to be carried out by someone with two qualities: financial need and hatred toward Jews or Israel.
Investigators said Ali S. asked his daughter whether she knew a Palestinian or Somali woman who needed money and would be willing to carry out the arson attack for 30,000 Danish kroner, roughly €4,000.
The BKA witness said the alleged arson plan formed part of a broader operation that included surveillance of Jewish targets and discussions about obtaining a weapon.
The court is expected to examine the weapons issue in future hearings. Investigators believe it could point to possible plans for killings as well as arson.
Iran trips and surveillance
The BKA witness, a senior female investigator who described the case without reading from notes, gave detailed testimony on how investigators traced the alleged operation through phone data, travel records, surveillance images and Telegram contacts.
According to the testimony, Ali S.’s mobile phones had been monitored for a long period, and German security officers followed him during several trips.
Investigators said he traveled repeatedly to Iran over the past year and met senior Islamic Republic officials and people linked to the Quds Force.
In one trip last January, he traveled from Berlin to Turkey and then to Iran, where he allegedly met his handlers. The BKA witness said Ali S. had also met the Quds Force official responsible for Israel-related affairs.
Much of the evidence presented in court came from Ali S.’s iPhones. Investigators said he searched for Jewish-owned kosher shops before traveling to Berlin.
Surveillance officers later watched him standing outside one of the shops and filming the site with his phone.
“On the surface, it looked as if Ali was making a phone call, but we knew he was actually filming the location,” the BKA witness told the court.
Investigators also said Ali S. searched for the address of Josef Schuster, head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, after returning from Iran.
Images and screenshots from Ali S.’s phone were shown on a large courtroom screen, including saved photos of Beck. The BKA witness said the material strengthened the suspicion that an attack on Beck had been planned.
The court was also shown high-quality surveillance images of meetings between Ali S. and Tawab M. at a McDonald’s restaurant. Investigators said the two often met there without realizing how closely they were being watched.
The BKA witness identified several alleged contacts used by Ali S., including figures referred to as Haji Ali, Kazem and Vahid. Profile images linked to some contacts, shown in court, carried antisemitic and anti-Israeli symbols.
Telegram was one of the tools allegedly used for communication between the suspects and their suspected IRGC-linked handlers.
Investigators portrayed Tawab M. as someone Ali S. allegedly brought in because he could be trusted and had anti-Jewish and anti-Israeli motivation.
Neither defendant appeared visibly worried in court. Both sat without handcuffs and were able to consult freely with their lawyers.
For Beck, the hearing marked the second time he had seen the faces of men accused of helping plan his possible murder.
He said he was satisfied that the alleged would-be attackers had been arrested, but added that he was not at peace.
German security agencies have warned in recent months of a growing threat from the Islamic Republic in Europe. Germany’s domestic intelligence agency has said Tehran may expand intelligence and terrorist operations in Europe after recent regional developments, a warning security officials view this case as helping illustrate.
Israel’s Ambassador to Australia Hillel Newman told Iran International on Monday that Israel saw the Iranian people as “friends and allies,” while drawing a distinction between them and the Islamic Republic.
“To the people of Iran, I would like to send a message and express our friendship,” Newman said. “The people of Iran are our friends and allies and friends and allies of the people of Israel.”
He described Iran’s government as “the evil regime,” accusing it of oppressing Iranians and attacking Israel.
“We care for the people of Iran and sympathize with them and wish them true freedom,” Newman said.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has deployed special forces along Iran’s Persian Gulf coast to identify in advance vessels using the Oman-side route through the Strait of Hormuz, sources familiar with the matter told Iran International.
The IRGC operatives are also seeking access, through Omani sources, to the schedules and coordination details of ships passing through the southern route of the Strait of Hormuz, the sources said.
The special forces deployed by the IRGC are equipped with various intelligence-gathering systems, including land-based observation posts, naval equipment and aerial systems, and have recently been tasked with identifying in advance any vessel intending to pass through the southern route and issuing warnings about it, the sources said.
The sources also say that IRGC operatives are extensively gathering information from Omani sources and agents to learn ahead of time about the coordination and schedules of ship movements through the southern route and receive related alerts.
The IRGC has said the only authorized routes through the Strait of Hormuz are those designated by the Islamic Republic. It has warned international vessels not to use the southern corridor, which passes through waters near Oman’s coast and has been recommended by Oman and the International Maritime Organization.
The deployment of the IRGC monitoring and identification network, and its attempt to access shipping information through Omani sources, comes as Washington and Tehran agreed on Sunday after several rounds of exchanges of fire, to a temporary one-week de-escalation in the Strait of Hormuz.
Talks between the two sides are expected to continue in Doha based on a new proposal put forward by Oman.
Sources say the Islamic Republic, while sitting at the negotiating table, is strengthening its identification and warning chain for vessels that do not use Tehran-approved routes — a route at the center of the current dispute between Tehran and Washington.
The attack on a Singapore-flagged vessel
The pattern of last week’s IRGC attack on a commercial vessel in the southern route is consistent with the new mission assigned to these forces.
IRGC forces on Thursday, June 25, targeted a Singapore-flagged cargo ship in the Strait of Hormuz near Oman’s coast. According to the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations, the attack damaged the vessel’s bridge but caused no casualties. It came only hours after the IRGC Navy warned against using unauthorized routes.
US warplanes on Friday, June 26, struck Iranian missile and drone depots as well as coastal radar sites. The IRGC Navy responded by attacking US positions in the region and, citing Clause 5 of the Islamabad memorandum of understanding, said arrangements for controlling traffic through the Strait of Hormuz were under the authority of the Islamic Republic.
Three rival routes in one waterway
According to reports, three different routes have now emerged for passage through the Strait of Hormuz: the southern route near Omani waters, the middle route used before the war, and the northern route under Iranian control.
Ships that choose non-Iranian routes risk being targeted, while those that pass through the Iranian route fear exposure to Western sanctions if the agreement collapses.
An analyst at the shipping intelligence firm Kpler told CNN that if the disputes are not resolved by mid-August, use of all three routes will become more chaotic and insecure.
Because of naval mines in the traditional traffic separation scheme designated by the International Maritime Organization in 1968, the middle route remains effectively closed, although Tehran has committed under the war-ending memorandum to clear the mines within 30 days.
Ship traffic is now moving through two routes: one near Oman’s coast and one near Iran’s coast. The Iranian Navy has also warned vessels to pass only south of Larak Island.
The dispute over Hormuz management
The IRGC’s attempt to access shipping information through Omani sources is especially significant because Muscat is both the coastal state for the southern route and the mediator and architect of the framework for the ongoing talks.
Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, the head of the Islamic Republic’s negotiating team, said in Oman on June 23 that management of the Strait of Hormuz would not return to the pre-war situation. He said Tehran, in talks with China and Egypt, had raised the idea of charging vessels a “service fee” modeled on the Dardanelles waterway.
But Omani Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi told Marco Rubio on June 25 that any possible mechanism for managing the Strait of Hormuz would not include tolls.
Officials of the Islamic Republic say Iran and Oman have joint sovereignty over the Strait and that after the 60-day deadline set in the memorandum expires, they will begin joint management and toll collection. The United States, however, regards the Strait of Hormuz as an international waterway and says any new mechanism there would require the approval of Persian Gulf countries.
Kazem Gharibabadi, Iran’s deputy foreign minister, has also previously said the safe passage of ships through the Strait of Hormuz cannot be guaranteed without coordination with Iran, warning that if such coordination does not take place, designated routes could be suspended.
A waterway far from normal
Two weeks after the signing of the 14-article Islamabad memorandum, which called for an end to the war on all fronts, the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz and the end of the US naval blockade, traffic through the Strait remains only a fraction of pre-war levels.
The number of vessel transits reached about 70 on June 24, the highest level since the start of the war. Before the war, an average of about 130 vessels passed through the waterway each day.
The secretary-general of the International Maritime Organization has said 14 seafarers have been killed since the start of the Strait of Hormuz crisis. The organization also temporarily suspended the evacuation of about 600 ships and 11,000 sailors stranded in the area after the attack on the Singapore-flagged vessel.
Tracking data nevertheless shows that ships are continuing to use the southern route despite Tehran’s warnings. The Joint Maritime Information Center, which operates under US Navy oversight, has also said the route near Oman’s coast is being expanded to allow two-way traffic.
Under these conditions, the IRGC’s deployment of special forces to identify vessels on the southern route in advance, and its efforts to obtain shipping information through Omani sources, show Tehran is preparing to exert control over the same corridor Washington and Muscat are working to expand.