Azerbaijan summons Iran ambassador after strike injures two in Nakhchivan

This liveblog is no longer being updated; for our new liveblog, visit here.

EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said on Thursday that Ukraine could share know-how on interceptor drones with the Arab states of the Persian Gulf to help boost production.

Kallas also said the European Union is not dependent on oil from those countries, limiting the impact of regional supply risks on the bloc’s energy security.

She also said political space is needed to prevent further escalation in the region and added that there must be room for democracy to get out of the cycle of escalation.

The Kremlin said on Thursday that Iran had not approached Russia with a request for arms supplies and that Russia’s position on the matter was well known.

Two senior figures in the Basij student organization at Tehran University and Amirkabir University of Technology were killed in recent Israeli precision strikes on Tehran, Amir Kabir Newsletter reported on Wednesday.

The report identified the dead as Mohammad Mehdi Ozgoli, the head of the Physics Faculty Basij at Tehran University, and Mohammad Mehdi Sharifi, the head of the Aerospace Faculty Basij at Amir Kabir University.

The two had roles in campus control and the suppression of protests, the newsletter said, describing the Basij student organization as an arm of security bodies inside universities.

A missile strike destroyed the 12,000-seat indoor arena at Tehran’s Azadi sports complex on Thursday morning following attacks by the US and Israel, the Iranian Students News Agency (ISNA) reported.

ISNA said all sections of the indoor hall and surrounding buildings at the complex were destroyed.

Previously there were reports that authorities were using some stadiums and sports venues in various cities to gather and station military and security forces, as well as equipment and vehicles, to shield them from US and Israeli strikes.

Israel’s military said it continued strikes in central Tehran, targeting infrastructure linked to Iran’s ballistic missile system.

In a statement, the military said it hit storage facilities for missiles both above and below ground. One of the targets in Tehran was an underground site used by Iranian authorities to store ballistic missiles, it said.

The military also said it destroyed storage centers for missiles intended to target aircraft.

South Korea has banned travel to Iran for its citizens starting at 6 pm (0900 GMT) on Thursday due to heightened safety risks from the war, its foreign ministry said in a statement.

Azerbaijan has summoned Iran’s ambassador after drone attacks were carried out from the territory of Iran on the Azerbaijani exclave of Nakhchivan, the Foreign Ministry said.

The ministry said two people were injured due to the attacks. It condemned the strikes and said Azerbaijan reserves the right to retaliate.

Earlier on Thursday, a source close to the Azerbaijani government told Reuters that missiles and drones flying from the direction of Iran fell on the territory of Nakhchivan International Airport. A fire started as a result of the incident, the source said, adding that an official statement would follow.

Video footage shared by the source showed black smoke rising near the airport terminal, which is about 10 km (6 miles) from the border with Iran.

Iran’s internet blackout has exceeded 120 hours, with connectivity still hovering around 1% of ordinary levels, NetBlocks said on Thursday.

“Meanwhile, an increasingly Orwellian environment is emerging as telcos threaten users who try to connect to the global internet with legal action,” the internet monitoring group said.

Israel estimates that more than 3,000 Iranian soldiers and regime operatives have been killed since the start of the war with Iran on Saturday, according to an Israeli assessment.

The figure was presented in situation assessment discussions and conveyed to Israel’s political leadership, according to details reported by Ynet.