​ Death of Ali Larijani deepens crisis at heart of Iran’s leadership. 14 minutes ago. Amir AzimiBBC Persian. Anadolu via Getty Images. The Israeli air strike which killed Iran’s security chief, Ali Larijani, has removed one of the Islamic Republic’s most experienced and influential policymakers at a critical moment.. Larijani was not a military commander, but he was a central figure in shaping Iran’s strategic decisions.. As secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, he sat at the heart of decision-making on war, diplomacy, and national security.. His voice carried weight across the system, particularly in managing Iran’s confrontation with the United States and Israel.. After the killing of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on 28 February, Larijani struck a defiant tone, signalling that Iran was prepared for a long conflict.. His death, now confirmed by state media, comes amid a broader campaign in which several senior Iranian officials and commanders have been killed within a matter of weeks. This pattern suggests a sustained effort to weaken Iran’s leadership structure during wartime.. Despite his hardline stance against the West, Larijani was often described inside Iran as a pragmatist. He combined ideological loyalty with a technocratic approach, favouring calculated strategy over rhetoric.. He remained deeply sceptical of engagement with Western powers, but he was also involved in key diplomatic efforts, including acting as an envoy in Iran’s long-term co-operation agreement with China.. ‘What if we’re left with ruins?’: Doubts creep in for Iranians who supported war. Wary allies show there’s no quick fix to Trump’s Iran crisis. What role has cyber warfare played in Iran?. At the time of his death, Larijani was in charge of managing three major crises.. The first was the war itself. He argued that Iran should prepare for a prolonged struggle and expand the conflict across the region and beyond, including closure of the Strait of Hormuz.. The second was a wave of domestic unrest, which began with economic grievances but quickly turned into wider protests seeking to topple the Islamic Republic. These were met with a crackdown that killed many thousands of protesters across the country.. The third was Iran’s nuclear programme and stalled indirect negotiations with Washington, both of which had already been disrupted by military strikes.. His removal leaves these issues unresolved and transfers them to an as-yet-unknown successor facing an extremely fragile situation. While Iran has shown resilience, partly by disrupting global energy markets, its airspace remains open to continued strikes. Any new senior figure will face immediate risk of being targeted.. Anadolu via Getty Images. This may shift power further towards the military. Recent remarks by President Masoud Pezeshkian suggest that armed forces units have effectively been given broad authority to act if senior leadership is incapacitated. In practice, that could mean decisions being ta  

​ Top US counterterrorism official resigns over Iran war, urging Trump to ‘reverse course’. 7 hours ago. Bernd Debusmann Jrat the White House. Getty Images. Donald Trump’s top counterterrorism official has resigned over the war in Iran, urging the president to “reverse course”.. In a letter posted on X, National Counterterrorism Center Director Joe Kent said that Iran posed “no imminent threat” to the US and claimed the administration “started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby”.. The White House dismissed the letter, saying the president had “compelling evidence” that Iran was going to attack the US first. A US hate monitor accused Kent of “antisemitic tropes”.. With his departure, Kent is the most high-profile figure within the Trump administration to publicly criticise the US-Israeli attack on Iran.. In the Oval Office on Tuesday, Trump said Kent was a “nice guy”, but “weak on security”.. He also said Kent’s resignation letter had made him realise “it was a good thing that he’s out”.. Follow latest updates. In the letter addressed to Trump, Kent alleged that “high-ranking Israeli officials” and influential US journalists had sown “misinformation” that led the president to undermine his “America First” platform.. “This echo chamber was used to deceive you into believing that Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States,” the letter continued. “This was a lie.”. Kent, a long-time Trump supporter who unsuccessfully ran for Congress twice, was nominated by the president early in his administration and narrowly confirmed to his post.. In his confirmation hearings, Kent refused to renounce claims that federal agents had fomented the January 2021 riot at the US Capitol, or that Trump had not been defeated in the 2020 election.. Democrats had criticised his hiring of a member of the far-right Proud Boys as a consultant to his 2022 election bid.. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), a US antisemitism monitor, said in a statement that accusations in Kent’s resignation letter “traffic in old-age antisemitic tropes”.. “So it’s no surprise that he would blame Israel and the media for pushing the President into war against the Iranian regime,” the ADL said.. The pro-Israel lobbying group, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac), reposted the ADL statement on X. Aipac did not immediately respond to a BBC request for comment.. Ilan Goldenberg, a senior official at the liberal pro-Israel advocacy group J Street, described Kent’s letter as “ugly stuff that plays on the worst antisemitic tropes”.. Kent, 45, is a US special forces and CIA veteran whose wife, navy cryptologic technician Shannon Kent, was killed in a suicide bombing in Syria in 2019.. The father-of-two deployed 11 times overseas with the US military, including with the US Army’s special forces in Iraq.. He later became a paramilitary officer at the CIA, before leaving government service following his wife’s death.. Kent cited his military service and  

​ India’s cheap weight-loss drugs could reshape global obesity fight. 9 hours ago. Soutik BiswasIndia correspondent. Bloomberg via Getty Images. India could soon get a lot thinner – at least in theory.. On Friday the patent on semaglutide – the molecule behind Danish drugmaker Novo Nordisk’s blockbuster weight-loss drugs Wegovy and Ozempic – expires in the country.. This will allow domestic pharmaceutical companies to release cheaper copies or generics, triggering a rush of competition that could slash prices by more than half and rapidly expand access for people in India, and eventually in other countries too.. Investment bank Jefferies has called it a potential “magic-pill moment” for India, predicting the semaglutide market could eventually reach $1bn domestically with the right pricing and uptake.. Analysts expect around 50 branded semaglutide generics to enter the market within months – a familiar pattern in India’s fiercely competitive pharmaceutical industry. When the diabetes drug sitagliptin went off patent in 2022, about 30 branded versions appeared within a month and nearly 100 within a year.. Affluent Indians drive boom in weight-loss drugs. India’s pharmaceutical industry, currently worth about $60bn, is expected to double by 2030. Much of it is built on generics – a manufacturing muscle that now sets the stage for fierce competition over semaglutide. What has until now been an expensive injection largely confined to affluent patients could soon become far more common.. Originally developed to treat diabetes, these drugs are now being hailed as game changers for weight loss, offering results that few previous treatments could match. Semaglutide belongs to a class of medicines known as GLP-1 receptor agonists, which mimic a hormone that regulates appetite and blood sugar.. By boosting insulin release and slowing the emptying of the stomach, the drugs make people feel full sooner and stay full longer. Originally developed for diabetes, they have become some of the most sought-after weight-loss treatments in the world.. Getty Images. Several Indian drugmakers are already preparing to make the move. According to Sheetal Sapale, vice-president at research firm Pharmarack, major firms including Cipla, Sun Pharma, Dr Reddy’s Laboratories, Biocon, Natco, Zydus and Mankind Pharma are readying branded generics, with many more likely to follow. Prices are expected to fall sharply.. Current monthly treatment costs are steep: Ozempic typically sells for 8,800 – 11,000 rupees ($95-$119; £71-£89), while Wegovy can cost 10,000-16,000 rupees ($108-$173). Sapale expects generic competition to push that down to roughly 3,000-5,000 rupees ($36-54) per month.. Lower prices could transform the market.. India’s anti-obesity drug sector – covering both injectables and oral medicines – has already grown rapidly, from roughly $16m in 2021 to close to $100m, according to Pharmarack. Demand accelerated after the launch of Rybelsus in 2022, the first oral versio  

​ Total repression and air strikes bring unrelenting dread for Iranians. 6 hours ago. Fergal KeaneSpecial correspondent. A woman stands on a rooftop listening to the sounds of the city below. There is only the dull hum of traffic tonight. But she knows how easily that can change. It is usually the dogs who notice the sound first and begin to bark furiously. The noise of aircraft. Then the ominous percussion of explosions. A ball of orange rising from an airstrike in a familiar neighbourhood.. The BBC has obtained footage and interviews from Tehran which evoke a city of strained nerves, of constant waiting for the next blast and relentless fear of the state security apparatus.. Baran – not her real name – is a businesswoman in her thirties. She is now too scared to go to work. “With the start of the drone attacks, no one dares to go outside. If I open my door and step out, it is like gambling with my life.”. She lives alone but is in constant communication with her friends. “My friends and I message each other constantly asking where everyone is…and even when there is no sound the silence itself is terrifying. I am doing everything I can to stay alive and witness whatever lies ahead.”. Like so many young Iranians, Baran saw her hopes of change devastated in recent months. Thousands of people were killed in a crackdown by regime forces in January after widespread demonstrations demanding change.. Anadolu via Getty Images. “I cannot even remember how I used to live in the past without being reminded of the loved one I lost during the protests,” she says. “I fear tomorrow. I fear the person I will be tomorrow. Today, I survive somehow, but how will I get through tomorrow? That is the real question. Will I even live through tomorrow?”. Now repression is total. Open dissent is impossible as the state’s watchers are everywhere. Footage we obtained shows regime supporters driving through the city at night, flags flying from their cars – a message to any who might be tempted to protest.. The official narrative is the only one allowed. State television broadcasts footage of demonstrations and funerals. Interviews with pro-regime officials and protestors offer repeated denunciations of America and Israel. In government propaganda the Iranian people are extolled as willing to suffer martyrdom.. Independent journalists still try to gather testimony that offers a credible alternative view, but they run the risk of arrest, torture and possibly worse. As one of them told me: “In wartime conditions you really don’t know what they are capable of doing.”. What Iranians are being told about the war. Iran taking steps to prevent anti-establishment protests, Tehran residents tell BBC. How Iranians are evading internet blocks to contact family abroad. It is only in their homes that some of Tehran’s residents feel able to share their feelings. Like Ali, a man in his forties, middle class and educated, who had hoped the killing of Ayatollah Khamenei at the start of  

​ Italy warns Russian tanker could explode in Mediterranean at any time. 14 hours ago. Sarah RainsfordSouthern and Eastern Europe correspondent, Rome. Miguela XUEREB/Newsbook Malta/AFP. A sanctioned Russian tanker loaded with liquid natural gas is drifting out of control in the Mediterranean with no crew on board and a gaping hole in one side, prompting warnings of a “serious risk of a major ecological disaster”.. An official in Italy, one of nine EU countries to write a joint letter to the European Commission urging action, has called the Arctic Metagaz an “environmental bomb” waiting to go off.. The tanker, part of a shadow fleet transporting sanctioned Russian oil and gas, was badly damaged in a suspected sea drone attack near Maltese waters earlier this month.. Ukraine has not commented on reports that it was responsible for crippling it.. The Arctic Metagaz is now floating south away from Italian waters and the island of Lampedusa towards Libya, with Italian and Maltese officials continuing to monitor its movement.. Speaking on Italy’s Radio 24, the secretary of Italy’s Council of Ministers, Alfredo Mantovano, said the risks from the tanker were “enormous” and warned that it could “explode at any moment”.. It is said to be carrying “significant” quantities of liquid natural gas, or LNG. An official in Rome told the BBC it also had 450 tonnes of fuel oil and 250 tonnes of diesel on board.. On Tuesday afternoon the tanker was about 45 nautical miles (83km) from Italian territorial waters and 25 miles from the search-and-rescue zone ascribed to Libya.. The Arctic Metagaz set out from the Russian port of Murmansk in February.. In early March, when it went up in flames, Russian President Vladimir Putin blamed Ukraine for a “terrorist attack”.. Russia blames Ukrainian naval drones as tanker is reported sunk in Med. But Ukraine sees such “shadow” Russian tankers as legitimate targets: they routinely sail with their transponders turned off to evade Western sanctions and the money Moscow makes from the oil and gas helps fund its ongoing war on Ukraine.. Russia has also been bombing Ukraine’s civilian energy infrastructure since the start of its full-scale invasion, leaving huge numbers of people without hot water or heating in the depths of winter.. Recently, the number and scope of drone strikes on Russian tankers has been increasing.. In December, the Ukraine’s SBU intelligence service said it had crippled three vessels in two weeks in the Black Sea, including the Dashan which it said had suffered “critical damage”. Just over a week later, the Quendil oil tanker was hit in the Mediterranean.. It was said to be empty at the time.. It is now two weeks since the Arctic Metagaz was badly damaged by a series of explosions and fire. The crew were located and rescued by the Libyan coastguard.. Libyan port officials said initially that the tanker had sunk, but it has been floating, unmanned and dangerous ever since.. The World Wildlife Fund has said it is on