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Rafsanjani's Daughter Accused of Propaganda Against Iranian Regime

Faezeh Rafsanjani, 2016 (File photo: AFP)
Faezeh Rafsanjani, 2016 (File photo: AFP)
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Rafsanjani's Daughter Accused of Propaganda Against Iranian Regime

Faezeh Rafsanjani, 2016 (File photo: AFP)
Faezeh Rafsanjani, 2016 (File photo: AFP)

An Iranian court has charged the daughter of the former Iranian president, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, with carrying out propaganda against the regime and blasphemy in social media posts, the Iranian judiciary announced Sunday.

Tehran's Public Prosecutor, Ali Salehi, said that the indictment was issued and referred to the court on charges of "propaganda activity against the system of Iran and blasphemy," according to the judiciary's website Mizan.

The charges relate to supposed comments made by Faezeh Rafsanjani, who is a former lawmaker and women's rights activist, during a radio debate on a social media forum last April.

Local media quoted Faezeh Rafsanjani as saying that Iran's request to remove the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) from the US list of foreign terrorist organizations is harmful to "national interests."

The official Iranian news agency IRNA later reported that Rafsanjani's daughter had apologized on April 23, saying she was "joking without intending to insult."

Faezeh, 59, is the daughter of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a former president who advocated rapprochement with the West and the US.

The former MP was arrested and sentenced to six months in prison at the end of 2012 on charges of "propaganda against the Republic."

The removal of the Revolutionary Guards from the list of terrorism is one of the tricky demands in the negotiations to revive the 2015 nuclear agreement.

Informed sources had recently stated that it is likely that European-mediated efforts to revive the 2015 Iranian nuclear agreement will be resumed following the visit of US President Joe Biden to the Middle East this month.

According to Bloomberg, a recent round of talks in Qatar failed to overcome the differences within the framework of the negotiations.

Two European diplomats with direct knowledge of the Doha negotiations said the talks had not made progress, but efforts to restore the deal are expected to continue beyond the July deadline suggested by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

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States Reach Agreement at Autonomous Weapons Talks in Geneva

Smoke rises in the city during a Russian drone strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine August 27, 2026. (Reuters)
Smoke rises in the city during a Russian drone strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine August 27, 2026. (Reuters)
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States Reach Agreement at Autonomous Weapons Talks in Geneva

Smoke rises in the city during a Russian drone strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine August 27, 2026. (Reuters)
Smoke rises in the city during a Russian drone strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine August 27, 2026. (Reuters)

The 128 ‌states party to a framework that regulates or bans weapons considered as indiscriminate, or causing too many injuries, agreed on a document on Saturday that could pave the way to international rules on autonomous weapons.

Agreement to the non-binding text marks a significant step after more than a decade of talks on how to regulate weapons systems that can identify and engage ‌targets with ‌varying degrees of autonomy, sometimes called "killer ‌robots".

However, ⁠one rights group ⁠said the text definition of an autonomous weapon and the measures to reduce their possible harmful effects on civilians appeared to have been watered down.

"It's a real shame that all the work done by states ⁠on the text over the past three ‌years has been ‌substantially diluted in the last hours," Nicole van Rooijen, ‌executive director at Stop Killer Robots, told Reuters.

The ‌member states of the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons had been meeting this week in the Swiss city of Geneva and reached consensus overnight.

The ‌agreement comes as alarm grows over the use of lethal autonomous weapons ⁠systems in ⁠conflicts, including those in Ukraine, Sudan and the Middle East. The document, reached by consensus, is non-binding but could open the door to formal treaty negotiations.

Talks went late into the night to overcome differences over language amid opposition from states such as the United States and Russia.

The US and Russia favor national guidelines over international legally binding rules. Washington sought flexibility in the non-binding text, including in areas related to exercising human judgment.

World

Nepali Woman Rescued Alive from Buried Home 10 Days After Flood

Damaged and sludge-ridden houses line the Trishuli riverbank in the aftermath of flash floods at Trishuli Bazar in Nepal's Nuwakot district on September 5, 2026. (AFP)
Damaged and sludge-ridden houses line the Trishuli riverbank in the aftermath of flash floods at Trishuli Bazar in Nepal's Nuwakot district on September 5, 2026. (AFP)
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Nepali Woman Rescued Alive from Buried Home 10 Days After Flood

Damaged and sludge-ridden houses line the Trishuli riverbank in the aftermath of flash floods at Trishuli Bazar in Nepal's Nuwakot district on September 5, 2026. (AFP)
Damaged and sludge-ridden houses line the Trishuli riverbank in the aftermath of flash floods at Trishuli Bazar in Nepal's Nuwakot district on September 5, 2026. (AFP)

Rescuers pulled a Nepali woman alive on Saturday from her home buried under thick mud and debris when the region was struck by massive flooding 10 days ago.

Emergency personnel said earlier they had rescued a Chinese man found alive inside a tunnel of the Upper Trishuli-1 Hydropower Project in Nepal's Rasuwa district.

Members of Nepal's Armed Police Force cheered as the mud-caked 64-year-old woman, Chandrika Shrestha, was pulled from her buried home in Nuwakot district.

"A police team found her as they were clearing the area. She has been airlifted to Kathmandu for treatment," police deputy superintendent Iqbal Hawari told AFP.

A video released by Nepal's Armed Police Force showed only a part of her house visible, with the lower floors completely submerged by thick sludge.

Emergency response teams have been working relentlessly to find survivors since a tsunami-like wall of water and mud swept through the China-Nepal border following a glacial and rock collapse on August 26.

So far, 1,344 bodies have been recovered in Nepal, according to the national disaster agency, with about 5,000 people missing.

In China, state media said 31 people had been killed and 531 were missing.

That takes the overall death toll to 1,375 people, with more than 5,500 missing.

World

Russian Attacks Kill 5 in Ukraine as Moscow and Kyiv Prepare for Visit by US Envoys

Firefighters work at the site of a warehouse hit by a Russian drone strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv region, Ukraine, September 4, 2026. (Reuters)
Firefighters work at the site of a warehouse hit by a Russian drone strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv region, Ukraine, September 4, 2026. (Reuters)
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Russian Attacks Kill 5 in Ukraine as Moscow and Kyiv Prepare for Visit by US Envoys

Firefighters work at the site of a warehouse hit by a Russian drone strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv region, Ukraine, September 4, 2026. (Reuters)
Firefighters work at the site of a warehouse hit by a Russian drone strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv region, Ukraine, September 4, 2026. (Reuters)

Russian attacks killed five people in Ukraine overnight, as Moscow and Kyiv await the arrival of US envoys to begin a new push for peace in the Kremlin’s 4 1/2-year-old invasion.

The planned visit by Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, who is also US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, is hoped to revive peace talks amid escalating aerial attacks by both sides. The last known visit to Moscow by Witkoff and Kushner, was in January, when they met Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin. They have never visited Kyiv, but President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he was expecting them in the Ukrainian capital on Sunday.

The air war between Russia and Ukraine has intensified as troops have struggled to make progress along the 1,250-kilometer (775-mile) front line. Russia has recently been using fast-flying, jet-powered drones, and the recurring wail of air-raid sirens has become part of daily life in Kyiv.

The strikes come even as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday that Ukraine would halt air attacks during Witkoff and Kushner’s visit and urged Moscow to do the same.

In a social media post on Saturday, Zelenskyy said that Russia had carried out overnight strikes on Kyiv and Boryspil International Airports, and linked the attack to the planned US visit.

“Clearly, these Russian strikes on the airports are a reaction to the discussions and preparations for the possibility of the US side using an aircraft to travel to Ukraine,” he said.

“We have taken note of this Russian move, and next week we will adjust our operation accordingly regarding Russian airspace, which has become dangerous because of our drones and missiles in the sky. Of course, there are and will be no threats to diplomacy from our side.”

Russian attacks killed four people and wounded five more at an industrial facility in Ukraine’s southern Dnipropetrovsk region, local military administration head Oleksandr Hanzha said.

He described those killed as employees at the site. “A locksmith, an electrician, a plumber and a machinist. People of peaceful professions. They were simply working their shift. They were doing their job when enemy missiles cut off their lives,” he said.

A 62-year-old man was also wounded and several private homes and an apartment building were damaged in a separate attack on the region’s Nikopol district, Hanzha said.

In a statement Saturday, Russia’s Ministry of Defense said it had carried out strikes on two metallurgical plants in the region, describing them as “major suppliers of metal products for Ukraine’s military production.”

A further two people were wounded in an overnight Russian attack on Ukraine’s Kyiv region, said Tymur Tkachenko, head of the regional military administration. In the Boryspil district, a fire sparked by a strike partially destroyed a nine-story residential building.

Russian forces also repeatedly struck a shopping center in the southern Mykolaiv region with drones overnight, damaging retail premises and sparking fires, Ukraine’s state emergency services said. A 72-year-old man and a 17-year-old girl were hurt.

Emergency crews responding to the incident were repeatedly forced to withdraw to safety because of the threat of further strikes, returning whenever conditions allowed, the emergency services said.

Russia launched ballistic missiles from its Rostov and Voronezh regions and deployed 167 attack drones overnight, Ukraine’s Air Force said. The drones included Shahed-type aircraft — around half of them jet-powered — as well as Geran and decoy drones. Ukrainian air defenses shot down or suppressed 128 drones, according to the Air Force.

Elsewhere, Ukrainian attacks wounded three people, including a 14-year-old girl, in Russia’s border region of Belgorod, local officials said.

In a statement, Russia’s Ministry of Defense said that its forces had shot down 53 Ukrainian drones overnight.