By Olivia Le Poidevin
GENEVA, March 11 (Reuters) - The United Nations aid chief warned on Wednesday that the conflict in the Middle East is straining humanitarian operations worldwide, disrupting supply chains and slowing the delivery of life‑saving assistance to numerous crisis zones.
“We are in a moment of grave peril for the Middle East and, actually I believe, for the wider world,” Tom Fletcher, the U.N. aid chief, told Reuters.
An Irish-language singer from punk-rap group Kneecap will not face a terrorism charge after UK prosecutors lost a High Court challenge Wednesday against a judge's decision to dismiss the case.
Liam O'Hanna was charged in May last year with displaying a flag of the proscribed Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah at a November 2024 concert in London under the UK's 2000 Terrorism Act.
But he walked free from a London court in September after a chief magistrate, Paul Goldspring, found there had been a technical error around the timings in bringing the case against him.
By Daren Butler and Ali Kucukgocmen
ISTANBUL, March 11 (Reuters) - The trial of Istanbul's jailed mayor, Ekrem Imamoglu, is a purely political affair aimed at preventing him from challenging President Tayyip Erdogan in the next election, Turkey's main opposition leader told Reuters in an interview on Wednesday.
Imamoglu, 55, appeared in court on Monday in the opening hearing of a sweeping corruption case involving more than 400 defendants linked to the Istanbul municipality.
ANKARA, March 11 (Reuters) - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday that the war in Iran must be stopped before the whole Middle East region is "thrown into the fire", adding that diplomacy must be given a chance.
NATO air defences have in the last week intercepted two Iranian missiles headed toward southern Turkey, where there are air and radar bases used by NATO and the United States, and the alliance has since beefed up defences there.
Iran's new supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei, who has not spoken or been seen in public since his appointment at the weekend, is injured but "safe", officials said Wednesday.
"I heard news that Mr Mojtaba Khamenei had been injured. I have asked some friends who had connections," the Iranian president's son, Yousef Pezeshkian, wrote in a post on his Telegram channel.
"They told me that, thank God, he is safe and sound," added Pezeshkian, who is a government advisor.
WASHINGTON, March 11 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump told Axios on Wednesday that there's "practically nothing left" to target in Iran and that the war there will end "soon."
"Little this and that... Any time I want it to end, it will end," Trump said during a brief phone interview.
The conflict began nearly two weeks ago with strikes on Iran by the U.S. and Israel aimed at dismantling Iran's military capabilities and nuclear program.
(Reporting by Bhargav Acharya, Katharine Jackson; editing by Susan Heavey and Caitlin Webber)
DUBAI, March 11 (Reuters) - The U.S.-Israeli war on Iran has threatened Gulf ports and disrupted global trade through the Strait of Hormuz through which roughly a fifth of the world's oil and liquefied natural gas normally passes.
Iran's Revolutionary Guards have warned that any ship passing through the narrow Strait will be targeted.
Below is a list of reported attacks since the war started on February 28:
MARCH 1
March 11 (Reuters) - Iran cannot participate in the 2026 World Cup after co-host the United States launched airstrikes against the country alongside Israel, killing its leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, sports minister Ahmad Donyamali said on Wednesday.
The United States and Israel launched airstrikes on Iran nearly two weeks ago, killing the Islamic Republic's supreme leader, leading to a region-wide conflict in the Gulf.
The United Nations aid chief warned Wednesday that the Middle East war was impacting aid routes and called for "exemptions" so humanitarian supplies could get through.
The war in the Middle East has effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, while fuel supply disruptions are sending freight rates soaring.
UN aid chief Tom Fletcher warned that the escalating war and its impact on the strait was having "a direct impact on our humanitarian supplies, including going to areas of key need in sub-Saharan Africa".
By Michaela Cabrera
PARIS, March 11 (Reuters) - UNESCO said it is deeply concerned about the fate of world heritage sites in Iran and across the region, after Tehran's Golestan palace, often compared to Versailles, and a historic mosque and palace in Isfahan were damaged in the war.
The United Nations' cultural agency on Wednesday urged all parties to protect the region's outstanding cultural sites, saying four of Iran's 29 world heritage sites had been damaged since the start of the U.S. and Israeli war with Iran.
