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Iran Launches Air Defense Drill Amid Rising Regional Tensions

An anti-drone missile is launched from the Khordad defense system during a military maneuver off the Arabian Gulf. (AP)
An anti-drone missile is launched from the Khordad defense system during a military maneuver off the Arabian Gulf. (AP)
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Iran Launches Air Defense Drill Amid Rising Regional Tensions

An anti-drone missile is launched from the Khordad defense system during a military maneuver off the Arabian Gulf. (AP)
An anti-drone missile is launched from the Khordad defense system during a military maneuver off the Arabian Gulf. (AP)

Iran said on Friday that it successfully carried out an air defense drill using drones designed to intercept hostile targets in an area stretching from its southwestern to southeastern coasts amid heightened tensions in the region.

“Iranian forces have successfully launched a new air defense method that uses drones to intercept and target hostile targets,” state-run Press TV quoted an Iranian army spokesman as saying.

The two-day drills, which began on Thursday, covered an area from Abadan in southwestern Iran to Chahbahar in southeastern Iran.

Press TV said the army’s air force and navy, the aerospace force and the navy of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) participated in the exercises.

Iran launched ballistic missiles at Iraq, Syria, and Pakistan against “ISIS sites” and in Iraq against what it said was a spy base for Israel’s intelligence agency Mossad.

On Dec. 10, Iran reinforced its air defense capabilities by adding combat drones equipped with air-to-air missiles to its arsenal.

In Oct., the army launched large-scale joint drone drills across the country, including the coastlines of the Arabian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman.

The army and its parallel counterpart, the Revolutionary Guard, jointly defend official borders across land, sea, and air. Recently, the army grappled with outdated weaponry and equipment while authorities prioritized bolstering the IRGC and enhancing its military capabilities.

However, over the past two years, the army forces have repeatedly declared the acquisition of drones, ballistic missiles, and "cruise" missiles.

The US and Israel accuse Tehran of providing fleets of drones to its loyal armed groups in the Middle East, notably to the Lebanese group Hezbollah, to the Houthis in Yemen, and armed Iraqi militias.

In April, Iran's defense ministry delivered the army with more than 200 new drones equipped with missile capabilities and electronic warfare systems.

Iran deployed a military flotilla to international waters. The flotilla departed Friday from the southern port city of Bandar Abbas, according to the IRGC-affiliated Tasnim news agency.

Rear Admiral Shahram Irani, commander of the Iranian navy, said Iran now simultaneously has four military flotillas in international waters.

Irani pointed to the navy’s two major operations in recent months, including the seizure of a US oil tanker in the Sea of Oman.

Earlier this month, Iran's Alborz warship entered the Red Sea to secure shipping routes amid heightened tension linked to the internationally significant water corridor.

On Jan. 11, Iran's navy seized a ship off Oman to retaliate for the confiscation of its oil from the same tanker last year by the United States.

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World

UN Watchdog Says Projectile Struck Iran Nuclear Power Plant

This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant in Bushehr, Iran, Dec. 7, 2025. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)
This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant in Bushehr, Iran, Dec. 7, 2025. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)
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UN Watchdog Says Projectile Struck Iran Nuclear Power Plant

This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant in Bushehr, Iran, Dec. 7, 2025. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)
This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant in Bushehr, Iran, Dec. 7, 2025. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)

The UN nuclear watchdog said Wednesday that Iranian authorities had reported projectile impact at the country's only operational nuclear power plant that caused no damage.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) "has been informed by Iran that a projectile hit the premises of the Bushehr NPP on Tuesday evening", the Vienna-based agency posted on social media. "No damage to the plant or injuries to staff reported."

Agency head Rafael Grossi "reiterates his call for restraint during the conflict to avoid any risk of a nuclear accident", the statement said.

The Bushehr plant in southwestern Iran has the country's only operational nuclear power reactor and was first connected to the grid in 2011, according to the IAEA.

Tehran has been under biting US sanctions since 2018, when Washington withdrew from a deal that granted Iran sanctions relief in return for curbs on its nuclear activities designed to prevent it from developing an atomic warhead.

Iran has always denied any ambition to develop nuclear weapons, insisting that its activities are entirely peaceful.

World

Iran Executes Man it Accused of Spying for Mossad

A man walks past an Iranian flag fluttering above the wreckage of a car in central Tehran, on March 4, 2026. (Photo by AFP)
A man walks past an Iranian flag fluttering above the wreckage of a car in central Tehran, on March 4, 2026. (Photo by AFP)
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Iran Executes Man it Accused of Spying for Mossad

A man walks past an Iranian flag fluttering above the wreckage of a car in central Tehran, on March 4, 2026. (Photo by AFP)
A man walks past an Iranian flag fluttering above the wreckage of a car in central Tehran, on March 4, 2026. (Photo by AFP)

Iran’s judiciary said Wednesday it executed a man it accused of spying for Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency.

The judiciary’s Mizan news agency identified the man as Kourosh Keyvani.

It alleged he “provided images and information on sensitive locations” to the Mossad. Keyvani was the first publicly announced execution for spying during the current war.

Activists and rights groups have warned since Iran’s nationwide protests in January that the country could begin conducting mass executions.

Iran violently suppressed the protests through violence that killed thousands and saw tens of thousands detained.

World

Cuba Vows ‘Unbreakable Resistance’ as US Pressure Mounts

A man walks on a street in the rain as Cuba reconnected its electrical grid across much of the island, according to the Energy and Mines Ministry, following a nationwide blackout that left about 10 million people without electricity, in Havana, Cuba, March 17, 2026. (Reuters)
A man walks on a street in the rain as Cuba reconnected its electrical grid across much of the island, according to the Energy and Mines Ministry, following a nationwide blackout that left about 10 million people without electricity, in Havana, Cuba, March 17, 2026. (Reuters)
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Cuba Vows ‘Unbreakable Resistance’ as US Pressure Mounts

A man walks on a street in the rain as Cuba reconnected its electrical grid across much of the island, according to the Energy and Mines Ministry, following a nationwide blackout that left about 10 million people without electricity, in Havana, Cuba, March 17, 2026. (Reuters)
A man walks on a street in the rain as Cuba reconnected its electrical grid across much of the island, according to the Energy and Mines Ministry, following a nationwide blackout that left about 10 million people without electricity, in Havana, Cuba, March 17, 2026. (Reuters)

Cuba's leader on Tuesday said the US would face "unbreakable resistance" if it tries to take over the impoverished island nation, as communist authorities scrambled to fix a nationwide electricity blackout.

Cuba's government is under increasingly crushing pressure, with Washington enforcing an oil blockade and openly stating it wants to end the nearly seven-decade-old US standoff with the one-party communist state.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Cuba's decision announced this week to let exiles invest and own businesses did not go far enough to allow free-market reforms that the Trump administration demands.

"What they announced yesterday is not dramatic enough. It's not going to fix it. So they've got some big decisions to make," Rubio, a Cuban-American and vociferous critic of the country's ruling party, told reporters at the White House.

President Donald Trump, who has heaped pressure on Cuba's communist government, said Monday he would "take" Cuba, adding: "We'll be doing something with Cuba very soon."

But his Cuban counterpart Miguel Diaz-Canel was defiant in the face of Washington's threats.

"Faced with the worst-case scenario, Cuba has one guarantee: any external aggressor will encounter an unbreakable resistance," he wrote in a statement on X.

Cuba is open to broad talks with Washington and allowing more investment, but it will not discuss changing its political system, an envoy told AFP on Tuesday.

Tanieris Dieguez, Cuba's deputy chief of mission in Washington, said the two neighboring countries "have a lot of things to put on the table" but that neither should ask the other to change its government.

"Nothing related with our political system, nothing with our political model -- our constitutional model -- is part of the negotiations, and never will it be part of that," she said.

"The only thing that Cuba asks for any conversation is respect to our sovereignty and to our right to self-determination."

The New York Times, quoting unnamed US officials, said the Trump administration has called for Cuba to sack Diaz-Canel, who is seen as resistant to change.

Rubio denied the report late Tuesday, writing on X that the article was "fake" and was among media reports that relied on "charlatans and liars claiming to be in the know" as sources.

- 'Taking Cuba' -

A total electricity breakdown Monday underscored the parlous state of Cuba's economy.

The country lost Venezuela as its chief regional ally and oil supplier this January after a US military operation toppled Venezuela's socialist leader Nicolas Maduro.

Power was restored to two-thirds of the country early Tuesday, including to 45 percent of the capital Havana, home to 1.7 million people.

"What we fear all the time is that the blackout will drag on and we will lose the little bit that we have in the fridge, because everything is so expensive," said Olga Suarez, a 64-year-old retiree.

"Otherwise, we are used to it because here almost all the time you go to bed and wake up without electricity," she told AFP.

Adding another scare, a 5.8-magnitude earthquake struck off Cuba's coast early Tuesday. There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage.

Cuba's ageing electricity generation system is in shambles, with daily power outages of up to 20 hours the norm in parts of the island, which lacks the fuel needed to generate power.

But since Maduro's January 3 ousting, the island's economy has been further hammered by a de facto US oil blockade.

No oil has been imported to Cuba since January 9, hitting the power sector while also forcing airlines to curtail flights to the island, a blow to its all-important tourism sector.

And Trump is explicitly saying he wants the Cuban government to fall.

"You know, all my life I've been hearing about the United States and Cuba. When will the United States do it?" Trump told reporters Monday.

"I do believe I'll be... having the honor of taking Cuba," Trump said.

"Whether I free it, take it -- think I could do anything I want with it, you want to know the truth. They're a very weakened nation right now."