A family-run financial network accused of laundering money for Iran’s Revolutionary Guards has been operating from London and moving funds through shell companies China and the UAE, according to sanctions records and leaked documents reviewed by Iran International.

Long viewed as merely an oil chokepoint, the Strait of Hormuz is now emerging as a digital flashpoint, after Iran floated “protection fees” for subsea fiber-optic cables crossing the waterway in a move experts warn could give Tehran new leverage.

Two years after former president Ebrahim Raisi’s helicopter vanished in fog, Iran has lost far more than a president: its succession plan, regional shield, aura of safety and confidence that time was on its side.

Iran’s state broadcaster is facing criticism after airing programs in which presenters and government supporters handled rifles and other weapons on camera, with critics saying the displays blurred wartime messaging with intimidation at home.

British prosecutors said on Monday that a team of Romanian men who carried out a 2024 knife attack on Iran International TV presenter Pouria Zeraati in London were acting as proxies for Iran.

Shahab Dalili, a US permanent resident jailed in Iran for nearly a decade after traveling there for his father’s funeral, has returned to Washington following his release from Tehran’s Evin prison, Hostage Aid Worldwide said on Monday.

Amnesty International said on Monday that executions worldwide rose to their highest recorded level in more than four decades in 2025, with the Islamic Republic responsible for the vast majority of the increase.

Severe shortages of opium syrup are disrupting addiction treatment across Iran, Shargh daily reported on Sunday, raising fears that thousands of recovering drug users could return to narcotics use as clinics struggle to secure supplies of a key maintenance medication.