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Threat-Hit Iranian TV Channel Resumes London Broadcasts

The skyline of the financial district known as The City, as the sun sets in London, Tuesday, Nov. 23, 2021. (AP)
The skyline of the financial district known as The City, as the sun sets in London, Tuesday, Nov. 23, 2021. (AP)
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Threat-Hit Iranian TV Channel Resumes London Broadcasts

The skyline of the financial district known as The City, as the sun sets in London, Tuesday, Nov. 23, 2021. (AP)
The skyline of the financial district known as The City, as the sun sets in London, Tuesday, Nov. 23, 2021. (AP)

Private network Iran International TV said Monday that it was broadcasting again from London having shut down its studios earlier this year due to threats it blamed on Tehran.

The station had been giving extensive coverage to anti-government demonstrations that erupted in Iran last year, and said two of its senior journalists received death threats in response to their reporting.

Acting upon police advice, it closed its base in the UK capital in February, but said in a statement on Monday that "Iran International TV has begun broadcasting from its new London studios".

"This resumption marks a return to London for Iran's most-watched news channel after broadcasting was temporarily moved to the United States earlier this year because of the credible, state-sponsored threats against its staff," it added.

London's Metropolitan Police last year installed concrete barriers outside the old studios in Chiswick, west London, to prevent any attack by vehicle and warned of "imminent and credible threats" to the lives of the channel's journalists.

The decision to close came after the arrest of Austrian national Magomed-Husejn Dovtaev, who was charged with terror offences having been seen photographing and filming the exterior of the studios.

The Persian-language network's general manager Mahmood Enayat celebrated Monday's news, saying "it is great to be back broadcasting from London".

"Britain is the home of free speech. Resuming our broadcast from here is a statement that we will not be deterred from serving the Iranian people with independent, uncensored news," he added.

The channel will now broadcast from a secure site in north London, supported "by the guidance and expertise of the Metropolitan Police."

Iran International TV employed around 100 journalists in London while a similar number work for the station in Washington, serving a global audience of 30-40 million Farsi speakers.

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Typhoon Gaemi Weakens to Tropical Storm as It Moves Inland Carrying Rain toward Central China

In this photo released by the Taiwan Ministry of National Defense, Taiwanese soldiers clear debris in the aftermath of Typhoon Gaemi in Kaohsiung county in southwestern Taiwan, Friday, July 26, 2024. (Taiwan Ministry of National Defense via AP)
In this photo released by the Taiwan Ministry of National Defense, Taiwanese soldiers clear debris in the aftermath of Typhoon Gaemi in Kaohsiung county in southwestern Taiwan, Friday, July 26, 2024. (Taiwan Ministry of National Defense via AP)
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Typhoon Gaemi Weakens to Tropical Storm as It Moves Inland Carrying Rain toward Central China

In this photo released by the Taiwan Ministry of National Defense, Taiwanese soldiers clear debris in the aftermath of Typhoon Gaemi in Kaohsiung county in southwestern Taiwan, Friday, July 26, 2024. (Taiwan Ministry of National Defense via AP)
In this photo released by the Taiwan Ministry of National Defense, Taiwanese soldiers clear debris in the aftermath of Typhoon Gaemi in Kaohsiung county in southwestern Taiwan, Friday, July 26, 2024. (Taiwan Ministry of National Defense via AP)

Tropical storm Gaemi brought rain to central China on Saturday as it moved inland after making landfall at typhoon strength on the country's east coast Thursday night.

The storm felled trees, flooded streets and damaged crops in China but there were no reports of casualties or major damage. Eight people died in Taiwan, which Gaemi crossed at typhoon strength before heading over open waters to China.

The worst loss of life, however, was in a country that Gaemi earlier passed by but didn't strike directly: the Philippines. A steadily climbing death toll has reached 34, authorities there said Friday. The typhoon exacerbated seasonal monsoon rains in the Southeast Asian country, causing landslides and severe flooding that stranded people on rooftops as waters rose around them.

China Gaemi weakened to a tropical storm since coming ashore Thursday evening in coastal Fujian province, but it is still expected to bring heavy rains in the coming days as it moves northwest to Jiangxi, Hubei and Henan provinces.

About 85 hectares (210 acres) of crops were damaged in Fujian province and economic losses were estimated at 11.5 million yuan ($1.6 million), according to Chinese media reports. More than 290,000 people were relocated because of the storm.

Elsewhere in China, several days of heavy rains this week in Gansu province left one dead and three missing in the country's northwest, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

Taiwan Residents and business owners swept out mud and mopped up water Friday after serious flooding that sent cars and scooters floating down streets in parts of southern and central Taiwan. Some towns remained inundated with waist-deep water.

Eight people died, several of them struck by falling trees and one by a landslide hitting their house. More than 850 people were injured and one person was missing, the emergency operations center said.

Visiting hard-hit Kaohsiung in the south Friday, President Lai Ching-te commended the city's efforts to improve flood control since a 2009 typhoon that brought a similar amount of rain and killed 681 people, Taiwan's Central News Agency reported.

Lai announced that cash payments of $20,000 New Taiwan Dollars ($610) would be given to households in severely flooded areas.

A cargo ship sank off the coast near Kaohsiung Harbor during the typhoon, and the captain's body was later pulled from the water, the Central News Agency said. A handful of other ships were beached by the storm.

Philippines At least 34 people died in the Philippines, mostly because of flooding and landslides triggered by days of monsoon rains that intensified when the typhoon — called Carina in the Philippines — passed by the archipelago’s east coast.

The victims included 11 people in the Manila metro area, where widespread flooding trapped people on the roofs and upper floors of their houses, police said. Some drowned or were electrocuted in their flooded communities.

Earlier in the week, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. ordered authorities to speed up efforts in delivering food and other aid to isolated rural villages, saying people may not have eaten for days.

The bodies of a pregnant woman and three children were dug out Wednesday after a landslide buried a shanty in the rural mountainside town of Agoncillo in Batangas province.