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Siemens Turns its Back on Iran, Tehran’s Challenge Goes to The Hague

Siemens Turns its Back on Iran, Tehran’s Challenge Goes to The Hague
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Siemens Turns its Back on Iran, Tehran’s Challenge Goes to The Hague

Siemens Turns its Back on Iran, Tehran’s Challenge Goes to The Hague

Iran’s legal challenge against renewed sanctions by the United States goes before the UN’s top court Monday, as Tehran seeks to avert painful punitive measures that could hurt its still fragile economy, AFP reported on Friday.

Tehran filed a suit against US President Donald Trump’s decision to reimpose economic sanctions at the Hague-based International Court of Justice last month.

The ICJ is expected to take a couple of months to decide whether to grant Tehran’s request for a provisional ruling, while a final decision in the case could actually take years, the news agency said.

Meanwhile, German industrial manufacturing giant Siemens said it was scaling back its Iran business after the reimposition of economic sanctions by the US, the German news agency dpa reported Friday.

The Munich-based company explained it would take appropriate steps "to bring business activities in Iran in line with the changing multilateral situation."

Siemens said it would continue to ensure compliance with all export restrictions and regulations "including US secondary sanctions.”

The US Embassy in Germany welcomed the news in a post on Twitter, pointing out that Siemens was not the only German company to leave Iran.

“We are pleased to see Siemens joining other German companies like deutschetelekom, Deutsche Bahn, and Daimler in leaving Iran,” the tweet said.

Last May, Siemens Chief Financial Officer Ralf Thomas told reporters the company would closely monitor the situation in Iran after Trump pulled the US out of a nuclear deal.

“We are assessing the implications of the Iran decision,” Thomas had said.

Trump slapped fresh punitive measures on Iran in early August after pulling out of the nuclear deal negotiated under his predecessor, Barack Obama. Trump accuses Tehran of financing terrorism.

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Trump Praises UK Troops as Brave Warriors After Widespread Condemnation

Soldiers from the Royal Regiment of Scotland carry the coffin of Captain Walter Barrie after his funeral service at Glencorse Kirk near Edinburgh, Scotland November 29, 2012. (Reuters)
Soldiers from the Royal Regiment of Scotland carry the coffin of Captain Walter Barrie after his funeral service at Glencorse Kirk near Edinburgh, Scotland November 29, 2012. (Reuters)
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Trump Praises UK Troops as Brave Warriors After Widespread Condemnation

Soldiers from the Royal Regiment of Scotland carry the coffin of Captain Walter Barrie after his funeral service at Glencorse Kirk near Edinburgh, Scotland November 29, 2012. (Reuters)
Soldiers from the Royal Regiment of Scotland carry the coffin of Captain Walter Barrie after his funeral service at Glencorse Kirk near Edinburgh, Scotland November 29, 2012. (Reuters)

US President Donald Trump on Saturday praised "brave" British soldiers, calling them warriors, a day after remarks he made about NATO troops in Afghanistan were described as "insulting and appalling" by Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

Trump provoked widespread anger in Britain and across Europe after he said European troops had stayed off the front lines in Afghanistan.

Britain lost 457 service personnel killed in Afghanistan, its ‌deadliest overseas war ‌since the 1950s. For several of ‌the war's ⁠most intense years ‌it led the allied campaign in Helmand, Afghanistan's biggest and most violent province, while also fighting as the main US battlefield ally in Iraq.

"The GREAT and very BRAVE soldiers of the United Kingdom will always be with the United States of America!" Trump wrote on Truth Social. "In Afghanistan, 457 died, many were badly injured, and they were among the greatest ⁠of all warriors. It's a bond too strong to ever be broken."

The Sun on Sunday ‌newspaper reported that King Charles' concern over ‍Trump's initial remarks had been ‍relayed to the president, who last year expressed his admiration for ‍the monarch during a state visit to Britain. Buckingham Palace declined to comment on the report.

Trump had also provoked an unusually strong reaction from Starmer, who has tended to avoid direct criticism of the president in public.

The British leader's office issued a statement to say the prime minister had spoken to the president on Saturday about the issue.

"The prime ⁠minister raised the brave and heroic British and American soldiers who fought side by side in Afghanistan, many of whom never returned home," the statement said.

"We must never forget their sacrifice," he said.

Veterans in Britain and elsewhere have been lining up to condemn the US president's comments to Fox Business Network's "Mornings with Maria" on Thursday in which he said that the United States had "never needed" the transatlantic alliance and accused allies of staying "a little off the front lines" in Afghanistan.

Among them was King Charles' younger son Prince Harry, who served two tours in Afghanistan.

"Those sacrifices ‌deserve to be spoken about truthfully and with respect," he said in a statement.

World

Woman, Boy Drown off Greece After Migrant Boat Sinks

The Greek coast guard rescues refugees and migrants. (AFP/Getty Images)
The Greek coast guard rescues refugees and migrants. (AFP/Getty Images)
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Woman, Boy Drown off Greece After Migrant Boat Sinks

The Greek coast guard rescues refugees and migrants. (AFP/Getty Images)
The Greek coast guard rescues refugees and migrants. (AFP/Getty Images)

A boat carrying over 50 migrants sank off the Greek coast, killing a woman and a boy and leaving three others missing, the coastguard said Sunday.

"Fifty migrants have been rescued and are being cared for by the authorities," after the accident off the island of Ikria in the northern Aegean Sea, a spokeswoman said.

"A rescue operation with a coastguard vessel is underway, and a team of rescuers and divers is expected later today," she said.

Strong winds were hampering rescue efforts, according to public broadcaster ERT.

Ikaria lies close to Türkiye's western coast, a frequent setoff point for migrants trying to enter the European Union.

Many migrants also take the much longer route from Libya to Crete in southern Greece.

The perilous crossings are often fatal. In early December, 17 people were found dead after their boat sank off Crete and 15 others were reported missing. Only two people survived.

According to the UN refugee agency 107 people died or went missing in 2025 off the Greek coast. The International Organization for Migration says about 33,000 migrants have died or gone missing in the Mediterranean since 2014.

World

Cuba Defends Military Drills as Deterrent Against US Aggression

A man pushes a tricycle past a jeep sporting a wheel cover with an image based on the US flag in Havana on January 23, 2026. (AFP)
A man pushes a tricycle past a jeep sporting a wheel cover with an image based on the US flag in Havana on January 23, 2026. (AFP)
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Cuba Defends Military Drills as Deterrent Against US Aggression

A man pushes a tricycle past a jeep sporting a wheel cover with an image based on the US flag in Havana on January 23, 2026. (AFP)
A man pushes a tricycle past a jeep sporting a wheel cover with an image based on the US flag in Havana on January 23, 2026. (AFP)

Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel defended his country's military preparedness exercises on Saturday as a deterrent against potential aggression from the United States.

US President Donald Trump this month warned that Cuba "is ready to fall" and told Havana to "make a deal" or pay a price similar to Venezuela, whose ousted leader Nicolas Maduro was taken to America by US forces in a January 3 bombing raid that killed dozens of people.

Venezuela was a key ally of Cuba and a critical supplier of oil and money, which Trump has vowed to cut off.

Diaz-Canel on Saturday supervised military exercises that included a tank unit from Cuba's armed forces.

He was accompanied by Cuban General Alvaro Lopez Miera, who is the minister of the armed forces, and other high-ranking military officials.

"The best way to prevent aggression is for imperialism to have to calculate the price of attacking our country," Diaz-Canel said in remarks broadcast on Cuban television.

"And that has a lot to do with our preparation for this type of military action... This takes on significant importance in the current circumstances," he added.

Cuba's National Defense Council, which is led by Diaz-Canel, recently met "with the objective of increasing and improving the level of preparedness and cohesion" among the country's leadership, according to an official government statement.

The council met to "analyze and approve the plans and measures for transitioning to a State of War," the statement added, without providing further details.

These military exercises are part of the country's preparation "under the strategic concept of the War of the Entire People," a term used by authorities for the mobilization of civilians in the event of armed conflict.