#MOSCOW, June 20. Russia and Ukraine may hold another round of talks after June 22, while Israel threatens to intensify attacks against Iran amid renewed missile strikes from the Islamic Republic. Meanwhile, Washington places Greenland under its homeland defense command. These stories topped Friday's newspaper headlines in Russia.


Vedomosti: Whether US will abandon Ukraine talks

Russian and Ukrainian negotiators may hold another round of talks after June 22, Russian President Vladimir Putin said during his traditional meeting with global media leaders on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) on June 19. At that event, he also expressed readiness to meet with Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky, even as he questioned the latter’s legitimacy.

Putin’s statement came as the Israeli-Iranian conflict entered its sixth day. US President Donald Trump, too, is paying close attention to the Middle East conflict, and he has repeatedly emphasized his intention to contribute to the Russia-Ukraine talks. But, unlike on this track, the US leader made clear which side in the Israel-Iran conflict he is going to support. Since the conflict erupted on June 13, Trump has issued stern warnings against Tehran and threatened to use force. On June 17, he wrote on his Truth Social media that he knows exactly where Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei is hiding, but that he is "not going to take him out (kill!)."

Trump’s involvement in the Israel-Iran conflict has sparked questions regarding whether he could in parallel coordinate the US role in the Ukraine negotiation process. And he has repeatedly voiced dissatisfaction with its pace. On June 16, the United States canceled separate talks on removing "irritants" with Russia, and Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova stressed then that Moscow expects that the pause will not be too long.

The likelihood of the Trump administration abandoning the Ukraine negotiation process is close to zero, Dmitry Suslov, deputy director of the Center for Comprehensive European and International Studies at the Higher School of Economics, told Vedomosti. Trump himself seeks to continue efforts toward peace in Ukraine, as Washington is not interested in continued war in Europe: in line with Trump’s policy course, any settlement must be final so that hostilities do not resume. The United States is pursuing this goal as it would like to reorient its resources and focus on countering China, for which Washington would need peace in Europe. The fact that Trump’s special envoy, Keith Kellogg, still handles the Ukraine issue shows that the United States has not withdrawn from the peace process. Without the United States, the negotiation process in Istanbul would stall.

The United States is still trying to find a peaceful solution to the Ukraine conflict, said Andrey Kortunov, an expert at the Valdai International Discussion Club. Trump has invested too much political capital in efforts to resolve this crisis to abandon them. Besides, the US president cannot easily shift focus to the Iran issue, even as the Ukraine conflict has been overshadowed by the latest escalation in the Middle East. As regards Ukraine talks, they could stall if the US pulls out of the peace process, the expert concluded.


Izvestia: Middle East bracing for escalation

Israel has threatened to intensify attacks against Iran amid renewed missile strikes from Tehran. The United States, too, may join the conflict: Donald Trump has reportedly readied a plan to strike Iran and has yet to issue a corresponding order. Meanwhile, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) does not have formal evidence of Tehran working to build nuclear weapons.



Tehran launched a fresh wave of Operation True Promise III as it fired kamikaze drones and strategic missiles toward Israel, the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) reported on Thursday morning. The latest stage involved around 20 missile launches, some of which hit residential areas in and around Tel Aviv, while a strike on Soroka Hospital in Beersheba in southern Israel left approximately 65 Israelis injured.

News agency Mahr said the Israeli army’s C4I cyber command headquarters and the military intelligence center in the Gav-Yam hi-tech park situated near the hospital were targeted. Israel said there were no military facilities near the clinic, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed retaliation saying: "We will exact the full price from the tyrants in Tehran."

Meanwhile, Israel struck Iranian nuclear facilities in Isfahan and Natanz on June 19. The IDF spokesman mistakenly said the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant, too, had been attacked, but an army official later refuted this report to TASS. However, Rosatom CEO Alexey Likhachev said that part of Russian employees have been evacuated from the Bushehr NPP as he did not rule out full evacuation from the facility.

According to Vladimir Sazhin, Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the situation in Iran is very tense. "Reform is needed, and this war triggered processes that have been ongoing in Iran. While there is no serious opposition in Iran which could overthrow the regime, 70% of the population has a negative attitude toward the current authorities, by some estimates," Sazhin said.

Not all experts agree. Farhad Ibragimov, an expert in Oriental studies, explained to Izvestia that Iran is consolidating around its leaders as the continued existence of the Islamic Republic is currently at stake.

As for Israel, the Jewish state has so consolidated around the fight against Iran to the extent that nobody is discussing any change of power there, Viktor Smirnov, in charge of the Department of Israel and Jewish Communities at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, explained, even as, previously, large-scale protests were held against Netanyahu, including over his failure to retrieve Israelis from captivity in Gaza.


Kommersant: Washington reassigns Greenland to homeland defense command

The United States continues to pursue a policy aimed at putting President Donald Trump’s idea of establishing control of Greenland into practice. News came recently that the Pentagon has transferred the Danish island from the US European Command (EUCOM) area of responsibility to the US Northern Command (NORTHCOM), which handles national defense. Denmark held an exercise, large enough for the country, to show that it is capable of controlling the area claimed by the United States on its own.

Trump has repeatedly stated previously that the United States needs Greenland, citing national security reasons. While NORTHCOM’s mission is to defend the American homeland, EUCOM is responsible for US troops and infrastructure in Europe.

Vitaly Yermakov, a research fellow with the Center of International Security at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of World Economy and International Relations, said aligning Greenland with NORTHCOM would, first of all, be viewed "in the context of Trump’s notorious expansionist plans." "Perhaps, this was driven by exactly those [plans] since the initiative came from the very top," he told Kommersant.

However, this step matters to the US military, too, in practical terms, Yermakov continued. "NORTHCOM mostly handles the country’s air defenses and anti-aircraft systems, and Greenland, which played a certain role there, is now part of the `defense perimeter’ in organizational terms," he explained. According to the expert, this work will be intensified as part of the initiative to build an integrated ‘Golden Dome’ capability. Besides, if the Americans decide to do so, they could justify themselves by saying that Greenland is part of the North American continent geographically, he added.


Izvestia: European Parliament to debate Russian gas phase-out later this month

In the last week of June, the European Parliament will vote on a roadmap to eliminate Russian gas from the EU markets, MEP Tomas Zdechovsky told Izvestia. Earlier, the European Commission released a plan to stop Russian energy imports by the end of 2027. The phase-out of Russian natural gas will hurt Hungarian and Slovakian industries and also undermine re-election chances of the two countries’ leaders, experts argue.


Under the plan, gas imports on existing short-term contracts must be ended by June 17, 2026, with a possibility of continuing supplies under longer-term contracts until the end of 2027. These measures will cover both pipeline gas and LNG. As a result, by January 1, 2028, the EU will have to fully abandon Russian natural gas. All EU countries will need to develop replacement programs for that.

The EU is also planning to ban Russian uranium imports as well, with a deadline for that pushed back until the early 2030s. Brussels will have to spend €241 billion to build supply chains, the Financial Times has learned.

Technically, Slovakia and Hungary could stop buying Russian gas imports, but it will come with a very high cost. Their industrial production will shrink as a result because manufacturing most products in those countries would simply not be profitable, and they will lose their global competitive advantage, Igor Yushkov, an analyst at the Financial University and the National Energy Security Fund, told Izvestia.

Slovakia could demand that this plan be rejected or seek relevant compensation, even as the government of Robert Fico is pursuing an inconsistent foreign policy, by supporting EU sanctions or the UN’s anti-Russian resolutions, Slovakian MEP Milan Mazurek told Izvestia.

Hungary and Slovakia have long-term contracts with Gazprom, and Budapest plans to import 8 to 8.5 billion cubic meters of Russian gas in 2025, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said at SPIEF. The two countries will have to pay a fine for severing those contracts, and European consumers will have to shoulder the cost of the EU’s anti-Russian policies again. Earlier, Kirill Dmitriyev, CEO of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), who is also an economic envoy for the Russian president, specified that the EU could lose over €1 trillion from the cessation of Russian gas imports.


Kommersant: Oil prices surge amid threat of US joining Iran conflict

Brent has soared to over $77 per barrel for the first time since January, with oil prices rising more than 11% since Israel and Iran started exchanging missile strikes. The new wave of price increases comes amid reports that the United States is considering a strike on Iran. The reaction of the Russian market to the price spike has so far been muted because of a time lag between oil sales and export revenues.

On Thursday, Bloomberg reported, citing its sources, that high-ranking US officials are getting ready to deliver a strike against Iran in the coming days. According to The Wall Street Journal, the US could target Iran’s Fordow enrichment plant. However, Trump earlier avoided giving a clear signal on the issue, saying that he has not yet made a final decision about striking Iran but will "one second before."

With the final decision still pending, the already touted plans were enough for market players to reprice the commodity. "A chain reaction to a variety of potential negative events is the key risk. These include a retaliatory strike from Tehran, or the threat to infrastructure in the Gulf countries, or the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz which handles roughly 20% of global oil and LNG exports," Ruslan Klyshko at AF-Capital specified.

According to Kirill Tachennikov, director of the research department at Sinara Investment Bank, told Kommersant that oil prices could as well rise above $80 per barrel should the situation in the Middle East escalate further. "Without the current geopolitical tensions, Brent could trade at around $67 to $68 per barrel. And oil’s geopolitical risks premium could either grow or decline, depending on how the situation develops," Lyudmila Rokotyanskaya, stock market expert at BCS World of Investment, warned.

Over 400 asylum seekers have landed at the small island of Gavdos near Crete, a new entry point increasingly used by migrant smugglers in past months, the Greek coastguard said on Friday.

Judge orders Columbia University protester Mahmoud Khalil freed from detention.

The former Columbia University graduate student left a federal facility in Louisiana on Friday. He is expected to head to New York to reunite with his U.S. citizen wife and infant son, born while Khalil was detained.

“Justice prevailed, but it’s very long overdue,” he said outside the facility in a remote part of Louisiana. “This shouldn’t have taken three months.”

The Trump administration is seeking to deport Khalil over his role in pro-Palestinian protests. He was detained on March 8 at his apartment building in Manhattan.

Khalil was released after U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz said it would be “highly, highly unusual” for the government to continue detaining a legal U.S. resident who was unlikely to flee and hadn’t been accused of any violence.

“Petitioner is not a flight risk, and the evidence presented is that he is not a danger to the community,” he said. “Period, full stop.”

During an hourlong hearing conducted by phone, the New Jersey-based judge said the government had “clearly not met” the standards for detention.

The government filed notice Friday evening that it’s appealing Khalil’s release.

Khalil was the first person arrested under Trump’s crackdown on students who joined campus protests against Israel’s devastating war in Gaza. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said Khalil must be expelled from the country because his continued presence could harm American foreign policy.

The Trump administration has argued that noncitizens who participate in such demonstrations should be deported as it considers their views antisemitic. Protesters and civil rights groups say the administration is conflating antisemitism with criticism of Israel in order to silence dissent.

Farbiarz has ruled that the government can’t deport Khalil on the basis of its claims that his presence could undermine foreign policy. But the judge gave the administration leeway to continue pursuing a potential deportation based on allegations that he lied on his green card application, an accusation Khalil disputes.

The international affairs graduate student isn’t accused of breaking any laws during the protests at Columbia. He served as a negotiator and spokesperson for student activists and wasn’t among the demonstrators arrested, but his prominence in news coverage and willingness to speak publicly made him a target of critics.

The judge agreed Friday with Khalil’s lawyers that the protester was being prevented from exercising his free speech and due process rights despite no obvious reason for his continued detention. The judge noted that Khalil is now clearly a public figure.

Khalil said Friday that no one should be detained for protesting Israel’s war in Gaza. He said his time in the Jena, Louisiana, detention facility had shown him “a different reality about this country that supposedly champions human rights and liberty and justice.”

“Whether you are a U.S. citizen, an immigrant or just a person on this land doesn’t mean that you are less of a human,” he said, adding that “justice will prevail, no matter what this administration may try to portray” about immigrants.

Khalil had to surrender his passport and can’t travel internationally, but he will get his green card back and be given official documents permitting limited travel within the country, including New York and Michigan to visit family, New Jersey and Louisiana for court appearances and Washington to lobby Congress.

In a statement after the judge’s ruling, Khalil’s wife, Dr. Noor Abdalla, said she can finally “breathe a sigh of relief” after her husband’s three months in detention.

“We know this ruling does not begin to address the injustices the Trump administration has brought upon our family, and so many others,” she said. “But today we are celebrating Mahmoud coming back to New York to be reunited with our little family.”

The judge’s decision comes after several other scholars targeted for their activism have been released from custody, including another former Palestinian student at Columbia, Mohsen Mahdawi; a Tufts University student, Rumeysa Ozturk; and a Georgetown University scholar, Badar Khan Suri.

By Philip Marcelo.

Billions of login credentials have been leaked online, Cybernews researchers say.

According to a report published this week, Cybernews researchers have recently discovered 30 exposed datasets that each contain a vast amount of login information — amounting to a total of 16 billion compromised credentials. That includes user passwords for a range of popular platforms including Google, Facebook and Apple.

Sixteen billion is roughly double the amount of people on Earth today, signaling that impacted consumers may have had credentials for more than one account leaked. Cybernews notes that there are most certainly duplicates in the data and so “it’s impossible to tell how many people or accounts were actually exposed.”

It’s also important to note that the leaked login information doesn’t span from a single source, such as one breach targeting a company. Instead, it appears that the data was stolen through multiple events over time, and then compiled and briefly exposed publicly, which is when Cybernews reports that its researchers discovered it.

Various infostealers are most likely the culprit, Cybernews noted. Infostealers are a form of malicious software that breaches a victim’s device or systems to take sensitive information.

Many questions remain about these leaked credentials, including whose hands the login credentials are in now. But, as data breaches become more and more common in today’s world, experts continue to stress the importance of maintaining key “cyber hygiene.”

If you’re worried about your account data potentially being exposed in a recent breach, the first thing you can do is change your password — and avoid using the same or similar login credentials on multiple sites. If you find it too hard to memorize all your different passwords, consider a password manager or passkey. And also add multifactor authentication, which can serve as a second layer of verification through your phone, email or USB authenticator key.

US President Donald #Trump believes that there still are chances for diplomacy with Tehran and he will make a decision on strikes on Iran within the next two weeks, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters in a briefing.

"Based on the fact that there's a substantial chance of negotiations that may or may not take place with Iran in the near future, I will make my decision whether or not to go within the next two weeks," she quoted Trump as saying.

Earlier, the US president did not rule out the possibility of US strikes on Iran. The Axios news website reported on June 17, citing sources, that Trump was seriously considering joining the war and launching a US strike against Iran's nuclear facilities.

Overnight into June 13, Israel launched a military operation against Iran. Tehran carried out a retaliatory attack in less than 24 hours. Israel and Iran exchanged strikes again in the following days. Both parties reported casualties and admitted damage to a number of facilities. The two countries continue to exchange strikes.

#IDF registers launch of Iranian missiles towards Israel . Civilians were instructed to enter a protected space and remain there until further notice. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has reported an Iranian missile attack targeting the territory of Israel.

"A short while ago, sirens sounded in several areas across Israel following the identification of missiles launched from Iran toward the State of Israel," the IDF said.

Civilians were instructed to enter a protected space and remain there until further notice.

Defensive systems are operating to intercept the threat, the IDF added.

#Moscow warns Washington against interfering in military actions against Iran, as this is fraught with uncontrollable consequences, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told a news briefing on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (#SPIEF).

"We would like to especially warn Washington against military intervention in the situation, which would be an extremely dangerous step with truly unpredictable negative consequences," she said.

Zakharova emphasized that Russia is actively engaged in political and diplomatic efforts aimed at resolving the ongoing conflict between Iran and Israel. "The priority today is to halt the escalation of violence, achieve a ceasefire, and restore peace. These steps are crucial for creating the necessary conditions to bring the situation back to the negotiating table. We are committed to facilitating this process in every possible way," she stated.

Zakharova recalled that on the very first day of the conflict's intensification, Russian President Vladimir Putin engaged in telephone discussions with both the Prime Minister of Israel and the President of Iran. The following day, he spoke with his US counterpart, and subsequently held conversations with the leaders of Turkey and the UAE.

"Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has also been active, communicating with the foreign ministers of Iran, Turkey, Egypt, and Oman. The current crisis in the Middle East was a topic of discussion in Lavrov's conversations with the Azerbaijani foreign minister, as well as during negotiations with Indonesia’s foreign minister. These dialogues are ongoing," Zakharova noted. "We hope that all parties recognize that there is no viable alternative to seeking mutually acceptable negotiated solutions to the problems at hand. Our support for a resolution concerning the Iranian nuclear program will always be grounded in international law, the principle of equal and indivisible security, and a balanced consideration of mutual interests."

She acknowledged Iran’s clear commitment to its obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, as well as its willingness to reengage with the United States to explore potential solutions that address unwarranted suspicions regarding its nuclear activities, contingent on the cessation of Israeli attacks.

"Moscow fully endorses this position and firmly believes that a lasting resolution can only be realized through diplomacy and negotiations," Zakharova concluded.
Conflict escalation

Earlier, Bloomberg reported that the United States was preparing for a potential strike on Iran in the coming days, though there was uncertainty about whether plans might change. The Wall Street Journal revealed that on the evening of June 17, President Donald Trump informed his aides that he had approved a plan to attack Iran but had not yet issued the order, expecting Tehran to abandon its nuclear ambitions. Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi indicated that Iran was considering all options in response to the possibility of US involvement alongside Israel.

On June 13, Israel launched a military operation against Iran, prompting Tehran to carry out a retaliatory attack less than a day later. Over the following days, the two countries exchanged further strikes. Both sides reported casualties and damage to some facilities, acknowledging that their forces had been hit. The cycle of mutual strikes continues to escalate. Russia condemned Israel’s actions and expressed its willingness to mediate in efforts to resolve the conflict.

#Iranian strike damages a hospital as latest missile barrage wounds dozens in Israel. Israel’s defence minister threatened Iran’s supreme leader on Thursday after Iranian missiles crashed into a major hospital in southern Israel and hit residential buildings near Tel Aviv, wounding at least 240 people. As rescuers wheeled patients out of the smoldering hospital, Israeli warplanes launched their latest attack on the country’s nuclear program.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz blamed Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for Thursday’s barrage and said the military “has been instructed and knows that in order to achieve all of its goals, this man absolutely should not continue to exist.”

While it remained unclear whether U.S. President Donald Trump would task American forces to join Israel’s sweeping campaign against Iran’s military and nuclear program, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he trusted that Trump would “do what’s best for America.”

“I can tell you that they’re already helping a lot,” Netanyahu said from the rubble and shattered glass around the Soroka Medical Center in Israel’s southern city of Beersheba.

U.S. officials said earlier this week that Trump had vetoed an Israeli plan to kill Khamenei. Trump later said there were no plans to kill him, “at least not for now.”

The U.S. has been weighing whether to join Israel’s attack by striking Iran’s well-defended Fordo uranium enrichment facility, which is buried under a mountain and widely considered to be out of reach of all but America’s “bunker-buster” bombs.

The conflict began last Friday with a surprise wave of Israeli airstrikes targeting nuclear and military sites, senior officers and nuclear scientists. At least 639 people, including 263 civilians, have been killed in Iran and more than 1,300 wounded, according to a Washington-based Iranian human rights group.

Iran has retaliated by firing hundreds of missiles and drones, killing at least 24 people in Israel and wounding hundreds.
More than 200 wounded, including dozens in the hospital strike

At least 240 people were wounded by the latest Iranian attack on Israel, among them 80 wounded in the strike on the Soroka Medical Center. The vast majority were lightly wounded, as much of the hospital building had been evacuated in recent days.

Israel’s Home Front Command said that one of the Iranian ballistic missiles fired Thursday morning had been rigged with fragmenting cluster munitions. Rather than a conventional warhead, the missile carries dozens of submunitions that can explode on impact, showering small bomblets around a large geographic area and posing major safety risks on the ground.

The Israeli military did not say where the missile with the cluster munition warhead had been fired.

Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard insisted that it had not sought to strike the hospital and claimed the attack hit an Israeli military intelligence compound near the Gav-Yam Negev advanced technologies park, some three kilometres (2 miles) from the hospital. An elite technological unit of the Israeli military has a branch campus in the area, according to the tech park’s website.

The Israeli army did not respond to a request for comment. An Israeli military official, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with regulations, acknowledged that there was no specific intelligence that Iran had planned to target the hospital.

Many hospitals in Israel, including Soroka, had activated emergency plans in the past week. They converted underground parking garages to wards and moved patients to them, especially those on ventilators or are difficult to move quickly.

Israel also has a fortified, subterranean blood bank that kicked into action after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack ignited the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip.

Doctors at Soroka Medical Center said that the Iranian missile struck almost immediately after air raid sirens went off, causing a loud explosion that could be heard from a safe room. The strike inflicted the greatest damage on an old surgery building and affected key infrastructure, including gas, water and air-conditioning systems, the medical center said.

The hospital, which provides services to around 1 million residents of Israel’s south, had been caring for 700 patients at the time of the attack. Of the 80 lightly wounded in the strike, half were hospital staff, it said. Afterward, the hospital closed to all patients except for life-threatening cases.

Iran has fired hundreds of missiles and drones at Israel, though most have been shot down by Israel’s multitiered air defences.
Iran rejects calls to surrender or end its nuclear program

Iran has long maintained its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes. However, in addition to having a nuclear power plant, it also enriches uranium up to 60%, a short, technical step away from weapons-grade levels of 90%. Iran is the only non-nuclear-weapon state to enrich at that level.

Israel is widely believed to have nuclear weapons — making it the only such state in the Middle East — but does not acknowledge having such arms.

Iran’s supreme leader on Wednesday rejected U.S. calls for surrender and warned that any American military involvement by the Americans would cause “irreparable damage to them.”

Already, Israel’s campaign has targeted Iran’s enrichment site at Natanz, centrifuge workshops around Tehran, and a nuclear site in Isfahan. Its strikes have also killed top generals and nuclear scientists.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said he would travel to Geneva for meetings with his counterparts from the United Kingdom, France and Germany, as well as the European Union’s top diplomat, indicating a new diplomatic initiative might be underway.

Trump has said he wants something “much bigger” than a ceasefire and has not ruled out the U.S. joining in Israel’s campaign.
Iran agreed to redesign Arak to address nuclear concerns

Israel’s military said Thursday its fighter jets targeted the Arak heavy water reactor, some 250 kilometres (155 miles) southwest of Tehran, in order to prevent it from being used to produce plutonium.

Iranian state TV said there was “no radiation danger whatsoever” around the Arak site, which it said had been evacuated ahead of the strike.

Heavy water helps cool nuclear reactors, but it produces plutonium as a byproduct that can potentially be used in nuclear weapons. That would provide Iran another path to the bomb beyond enriched uranium, should it choose to pursue the weapon.

Iran had agreed under its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers to redesign the facility to alleviate proliferation concerns. That work was never completed.

The reactor became a point of contention after Trump withdrew from the nuclear deal in 2018. Ali Akbar Salehi, a high-ranking nuclear official in Iran, said in 2019 that Tehran bought extra parts to replace a portion of the reactor that it had poured concrete into under the deal.

Israel said strikes were carried out “in order to prevent the reactor from being restored and used for nuclear weapons development.”

The International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog, has been urging Israel not to strike Iranian nuclear sites. IAEA inspectors reportedly last visited Arak on May 14.

Due to restrictions Iran imposed on inspectors, the IAEA has said it lost “continuity of knowledge” about Iran’s heavy water production — meaning it could not absolutely verify Tehran’s production and stockpile.

By Sam Mednick, Natalie Melzer, And Jon Gambrell

Archaeologists have assembled the “world’s most difficult jigsaw puzzle” to reveal huge frescoes that once adorned a luxury villa in Roman London.

Fragments of shattered wall plaster, which were discovered during excavations by experts from the Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA), have been meticulously pieced together to reveal frescoes that covered about 20 internal walls of the building.

The significance of the plaster pieces was not immediately apparent when they were first unearthed at a site in Southwark. Thousands of fragments were found dumped in a large pit, probably as a result of Roman demolition work carried out prior to 200 AD, MOLA said.

Han Li, senior building material specialist at MOLA, spent three months painstakingly laying out the fragments in order to restore the massive artwork, which has not been seen for more than 1,800 years.

It features painted images of fruit, flowers, birds, candelabras and stringed musical instruments popular at the time.

Countries are evacuating their nationals from Israel and Iran by air, land and sea as conflict rages between the bitter rivals.

Days of attacks and reprisals by the two enemies have shuttered airspace across the Middle East, severely disrupting commercial flights and leaving people unable to get in or out of the region easily.

Some governments are using land borders to get their citizens out by road to countries where airports remain open.

Thousands of foreigners have already left since the conflict started last Friday when Israel launched surprise missile strikes on Iran.
Bulgaria

Bulgaria has moved all its diplomats from Tehran to the capital of Azerbaijan, Baku, the Balkan country’s prime minister said Thursday.

“We are not closing the embassy, ​​but moving it to Baku until the danger passes,” said Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov.

A group of 89 Bulgarians was evacuated from Israel by plane to Sofia, along with 59 nationals from Slovenia, the U.S., Belgium, Albania, Kosovo and Romania.

They left from the Egyptian city of Sharm el-Sheikh, where they had been transferred by bus across the border from Israel.

He said the government had urged all Bulgarians willing to join the convoy to do so. They set off in 11 vehicles on Wednesday morning.

“There were alternatives. They could travel via Turkey, but eventually we decided that they should go via Azerbaijan,” Zhelyazkov added.
China

China said it has evacuated more than 1,600 nationals from Iran and “several hundred others” from Israel.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said Beijing would continue to do its “utmost to assist in the safe transfer and evacuation of Chinese citizens.”

Aell Huang, who was in the Iranian city of Isfahan, said he didn’t feel safe during the conflict. “I heard explosions from time to time. Civilians got hurt too. I got more prepared mentally once I saw the embassy’s warning.”

He and some friends hired a car and headed to Azerbaijan, waiting at border control for almost 12 hours, where he saw as many as 60 other Chinese nationals.

The Chinese Embassy said it would organize group evacuations by bus from Israel starting Friday.

A notice posted on the embassy’s WeChat social media account said citizens would be taken out through the Taba border crossing to Egypt. It asked them to register online and said they would be notified of the evacuation time.

People carrying Chinese, Hong Kong, and Macao passports were eligible, the notice said.
European Union

The European Union has helped evacuate some 400 people from Israel via Jordan and Egypt as part of its efforts to coordinate an emergency response within the 27-nation bloc.

“Member states coordinate the list and we co-finance these flights up to 75 per cent of the transport costs,” European Commission spokesperson Eva Hrncirova told a regular press conference in Brussels on Wednesday.

Hrncirova said the E.U. was fielding requests by Slovakia, Lithuania, Greece, and Poland for assistance with Middle East evacuations.
France

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said Thursday it was helping nationals who want to leave Iran and Israel to do so through neighboring countries where commercial flights were still available.

Barrot said people in Iran could travel to Armenia and Turkey without a visa. Those unable to reach the border on their own would be “transported by convoy by the end of the week” so they could take commercial flights to France.

French nationals wanting to leave Israel can go via Jordan and Egypt. From Friday morning, some buses will carry passengers from the Israeli border to Amman and Sharm el-Sheikh airports.
Germany

Germany flew 171 people out of Amman on a special flight on Wednesday. A further 174 people returned on Thursday and another flight is planned this weekend.

Passenger Daniel Halav, who was stuck in Tel Aviv, said he had “never been so glad to be home” after landing in Frankfurt, the German news agency dpa reported.

But, he said, “we had to take care of ourselves of how we got to Amman. From my point of view, we were left a bit alone there.”

The German Foreign Ministry said officials had decided against organizing convoys to get people to Amman, arguing this move could have created a security risk and that those wishing to leave were scattered across Israel.
Greece

Greece’s Foreign Ministry said 141 Greeks and other nationals have been evacuated from Israel via Egypt.

The group included citizens from Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, France, Germany, Georgia, Hungary, Italy, Lithuania, Portugal, Romania, Sweden, Switzerland, and the U.S.

They were flown to Athens early Wednesday from Sharm el-Sheikh aboard two military transport planes.
India

India said it evacuated 110 students by road from northern Iran to the Armenian capital, Yerevan. They left on a special flight on June 18.

The Indian Embassy in Iran has been helping nationals to move from areas experiencing increased hostilities to relatively safer areas within the country, subsequently evacuating them, according to the Ministry of External Affairs in New Delhi.
Israel

As of Thursday, some 22,000 holidaymakers had asked the Israeli Tourism Ministry to help them leave the country. There are around 38,000 tourists in Israel.

The Transport Ministry said thousands of Israelis have returned daily in the past few days, with 21 planes bringing back nationals stranded abroad since the start of the aerial campaign against Iran.

The Population, Immigration, and Border Authority said 38,250 Israelis entered the country between June 13 and 19, and 21,456 left during the same period.

The majority of arrivals and departures were by land.
Middle East and North Africa

Oman said Thursday it had evacuated 245 of its citizens and nationals from other countries via the Iranian coastal city of Bandar Abbas.

Ten buses transported Omani citizens from Iran’s north into Turkey. A further three buses crossed into Iraq.
Indonesia

The Indonesian government on Thursday decided to evacuate its nationals from Iran.

“Our citizens are at risk,” Indonesia’s Foreign Affairs Minister Sugiono said. “Over the past two days, Israel’s attacks have grown more intense, not only targeting the military, but also civilians.”

He said about 386 Indonesians, mostly students, were in Iran, primarily in the city of Qom. The ministry earlier said some 194 Indonesians were in Israel, mostly student interns in the southern city of Rafah.

Sugiono did not give a timeframe for evacuations, but said Iran has promised to help with the process.
Japan

Japan is sending two military aircraft to Djibouti to stand by for the possible airlifting of Japanese nationals from Iran.

Defence Minister Gen Nakatani told reporters he had issued an order to send two C-2 transport aircraft, along with 120 armed forces personnel, to the Horn of Africa nation, where Japan has a military base. An advance team of servicemembers left Japan earlier Thursday.

Chief of the Self-Defence Forces Joint Staff Gen. Yoshihide Yoshida said the C-2 dispatch was to secure multiple options for evacuation when necessary.

Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi said the embassy in Iran was preparing to evacuate an unspecified number of Japanese nationals by bus.

Some 280 Japanese are in Iran, and 1,000 are in Israel.
Poland

Deputy Foreign Minister Henryka Moscicka-Dendys said a group would depart from Amman by military aircraft on Thursday, following road transportation from Israel to the Jordanian border.

Some 160 Poles arrived in Warsaw on Wednesday morning from Israel via Egypt, the Polish news agency PAP reported.

The deputy minister said while there were no plans to evacuate citizens from Iran, Warsaw was helping with the departure of non-essential personnel from the embassy in Tehran.

The staff, along with seven Polish citizens, left the Iranian capital on Wednesday morning for the Azerbaijan border.
South Korea

South Korea’s Foreign Ministry says 18 South Korean nationals and two Iranian family members were evacuated from Iran and arrived in Turkmenistan late Wednesday by land.

The ministry described the evacuation as a preemptive move to protect citizens as the closure of airspace would have otherwise made it difficult for them to leave.

It urged South Koreans in Iran and Israel to promptly depart in line with embassy instructions and advised travelers to cancel or postpone trips to the region.

Twenty-five nationals and one Israeli family member were escorted out of Israel by embassy staff and arrived in Jordan on Thursday morning.
Thailand

Thai nationals have been advised to leave Tehran at the earliest opportunity and avoid traveling to affected areas, although there is no immediate plan for an evacuation from Iran, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nikorndej Balankura said Wednesday.

He said there are about 350 Thais in Iran and only five had expressed a wish to return to Thailand.

The embassy in Tehran has set up a temporary shelter for Thais in Amol and has temporarily relocated its office to Kordan to ensure the safety of those needing to travel for the services.

The embassy has also prepared the land routes for Thais to travel to Iran’s neighbors, Nikorndej said.
U.S.

The State Department is planning to evacuate Americans from Israel by air and on cruise ships, according to the U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee. Huckabee said Americans interested in leaving Israel should enroll in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program for updates.

There are some 700,000 Americans, many of them dual U.S.-Israeli citizens, in Israel and thousands more in other Mideast countries, including Iran.

Associated Press writers from around the world contributed to this report.