A boat carrying migrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan has sunk in Lake Van in eastern Turkey, with at least seven people dead, officials say. The lake is near the border with Iran, from where migrants often cross into Turkey on their journey towards Europe. Sixty-four people were rescued and taken to nearby hospitals and shelters. The incident happened at around 03:00 local time (00:00 GMT). It was not clear why they were on the boat in the lake which…

Iran has unveiled a redevelopment of part of its Arak heavy water reactor in a move that did not breach international restrictions on its nuclear work, but showed it is developing the sector in the face of United States pressure. Iranian state media said on Monday that technicians switched on a secondary circuit at Arak, a plant built to produce the heavy water used as a moderator to slow down reactions in the core of nuclear reactors. "Today, we are ... starting a…

A Reuters investigation has uncovered that the death toll from last month's protests in Iran is much higher than initial estimates, and that the crackdown was personally ordered by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

WASHINGTON — It is billed as an easy and secure way to chat by video or text message with friends and family, even in a country that has restricted popular messaging services like WhatsApp and Skype. But the service, ToTok, is actually a spying tool, according to American officials familiar with a classified intelligence assessment and a New York Times investigation into the app and its developers. It is used by the government of the United Arab Emirates to try…

Russia has successfully tested Runet, a country-wide alternative to the global internet, its government has announced. Details of what the test involved were vague but, according to the Ministry of Communications, ordinary users did not notice any changes. The results will now be presented to President Putin. Experts remain concerned about the trend for some countries to dismantle the internet. "Sadly, the Russian direction of travel is just another step in the increasing breaking-up of the internet," said Prof Alan…

GENEVA (Reuters) - U.S. sanctions against Iran are a “reckless addiction” Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said in a tweet on Sunday. “The U.S.’ approach to sanctions betrays a pathological and reckless addiction — a condition that renders no bounds or boundary to what the U.S. may or may not do,” Zarif wrote. “And this addictive behaviour affects friends and foes alike, unless collectively pushed back.” Friction between Tehran and Washington has increased since last year when U.S. President…

Iran's prosecutor general has denied conditional release for a jailed British-Iranian woman and a prominent human rights activist, a lawyer for the two said, according to state media. "We had requested conditional parole and furlough for both Nazanin Zaghari and Narges Mohammadi, and the prosecutor general has disagreed with both," Mahmoud Behzadirad said, quoted late Saturday by state news agency IRNA. "Conditional parole is my clients' legal right," the lawyer added. Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe was arrested in 2016 as she was leaving Iran after…

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has welcomed Japan's decision not to join a United States-led naval mission in the Gulf and said he had discussions on ways of "breaking" the US sanctions. "Japan has announced it will not take part in the Americans' plans for security in the [Gulf] region ... which is something we welcome," Rouhani said on state TV on Saturday after returning from a trip to Malaysia and Japan. More: 'Vicious crackdown': Iran protest death toll at 304,…