Iran-US war latest: Tehran vows to avenge security chief Ali Larijani’s death with ‘decisive’ retaliation

Fifa has appeared to rule out the possibility of relocating Iran’s matches at the World Cup to Mexico following the US and Israeli air strikes on the country.

It comes after the president of the Iranian football federation, Mehdi Taj, said Iran was “negotiating” with Fifa to move the team’s matches outside of the United States due to the ongoing conflict.

US president Donald Trump said last week that he did not believe it was “appropriate” for Iran to play games in America “for their own life and safety”.

ran has reportedly executed a man accused of spying for Israel.

The man, identified as Kurosh Keyvani, was found “guilty of providing Israel’s spy agency, Mossad, with pictures and information about sensitive locations in Iran”, the judiciary’s Mizan news agency reported this morning.

South Korea will limit naphtha exports and temporarily designate it as a supply-chain economic security item, the finance minister said, as authorities try to shield companies and consumers from the impact of the Middle East conflict.

Naphtha is a light, flammable petroleum product used mainly as a feedstock in petrochemical plants to produce plastics and chemicals.

The government will boost financial support for affected petrochemical companies by 1.5 trillion won ($1.01bn), including for the cost of alternative imports and preferential interest rates for firms handling high-risk economic security items, finance minister Koo Yun-cheol said today.

The country on Monday lifted caps on coal-fired power generation and moved to raise nuclear reactor utilisation to around 80 per cent, aimed at reducing reliance on oil and liquefied natural gas.

The Qatari defence ministry this morning said its armed forces have intercepted a missile attack targeting the country.

Kuwait’s national guard said it shot down seven drones during the early hours.

Oil prices eased this morning to pare back some of yesterday’s sharp gains after the Iraqi government and Kurdish authorities reached ​a deal to resume oil exports via Turkey’s Ceyhan port, providing modest relief to ‌concerns about Middle East supplies.

But with no signs of a de-escalation of the Iran conflict, which has left oil exports from the Middle East largely halted, Brent futures prices have settled above $100 per barrel for the prior four consecutive ​sessions.

After rising more than 3 per cent yesterday, Brent futures edged back 67 cents, or 0.65 per cent, ​to $102.75 a barrel by 2am GMT today.

US West Texas Intermediate crude ⁠dropped $1.18, or 1.23 per cent, to $95.03.

Iraqi’s oil minister Hayan Abdel-Ghani said oil flows from Ceyhan were expected to start at ​7am GMT today, according to state media. Two oil officials said last week that Iraq was ​seeking to pump at least 100,000 barrels per day of crude through the port.

“While it all helps and buys some time, the 100,000 bpd is not a huge game changer as Iraq has still lost about two million barrels ​per day,” said IG market analyst Tony Sycamore.

Two people were killed near Tel Aviv during an Iranian missile barrage, Israeli officials said.

The deaths brought the toll from missiles fired on Israel to 14, and came after another day of heavy Israeli bombardment of targets in Iran and Lebanon.

“We saw smoke rising from a building with extensive damage and shattered glass,” the Magen David Adom emergency responders said.

The pair had no pulse and were not breathing, it added. “We had no choice but to pronounce them dead at the scene.”

A top security official in US president Donald Trump’s administration resigned on Tuesday over the war in Iran, saying the country had posed no imminent threat to the US.

Joe Kent, who headed the National Counterterrorism Center, is the first senior official in Trump’s administration to step down over the conflict, now in its third week.

“I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran. Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful lobby,” Mr Kent wrote in a letter posted to social media.

Some experts have said that an imminent threat would be required for the United States to launch a war under international law.

Mr Kent’s letter included “false claims,” White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in a statement.

“As president Trump has clearly and explicitly stated, he had strong and compelling evidence that Iran was going to attack the United States first,” Ms Leavitt said.

“This evidence was compiled from many sources and factors.”

Iranian army chief Amir Hatami has vowed to launch a “decisive and regrettable” retaliation against Israel for the killing of security chief Ali Larijani.

“Iran’s response to the assassination of the secretary of the supreme national security council will be decisive and regrettable,” Mr Hatami said in a statement.

Iran’s supreme national security council on Tuesday confirmed the death of its chief. “The pure souls of the martyrs embraced the purified soul of God’s righteous servant, Martyr Dr Ali Larijani,” the council said, adding that his son and his bodyguards had died with him.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, the powerful military force separate from the army, said it had launched missiles at central Israel “in revenge for the blood of” Larijani and his companions.

US Senator Ted Cruz has said the chances of a US “extended occupation” of Iran are “zero”.

“We are not going to see a scenario where we see hundreds of thousands of American troops on the ground for an extended period of time”, the Texas Republican told CBS News’ Major Garrett.

“I could envision an operation, perhaps something like what we saw in Venezuela…I could envision limited boots on the ground for a specific objective, but I think the chance of anything like an extended occupation, the chances of that are zero”, Cruz added.