US President Donald Trump attended the return Saturday of the bodies of the first six US soldiers killed during the escalating war with Iran.
Trump, wearing a white "USA" baseball cap, saluted as troops carried each flag-draped case from a military transport plane at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, where the remains of US troops killed overseas are returned to American soil.
By Samia Nakhoul and Parisa Hafezi
March 7 (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia has told Tehran that while it favours a diplomatic settlement to Iran's conflict with the United States, continued attacks on the kingdom and its energy sector could push Riyadh to respond in kind, four sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.
The message was conveyed before a speech on Saturday in which Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian apologised to neighbouring Gulf states for Tehran’s actions -- an apparent attempt to defuse regional anger over Iranian strikes that hit civilian targets.
Sri Lanka will treat Iranian sailors rescued from a torpedoed frigate according to international law, a minister said Saturday, following reports that Washington was pressuring Colombo to not repatriate them.
Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath told a conference in New Delhi that Sri Lanka was caring for 32 sailors from the Iranian frigate IRIS Dena under Colombo's international treaty obligations.
The frigate was sunk by a US submarine on Wednesday just off Sri Lanka's southern coast.
Sri Lanka sent its navy to rescue survivors and recovered 84 bodies.
By Humeyra Pamuk, Simon Lewis and Erin Banco
WASHINGTON, March 7 (Reuters) - As the first explosions from Iran's retaliatory attack sounded across the United Arab Emirates last Saturday, the State Department was still scrambling to finalize a key bureaucratic task - securing approvals for at least three U.S. embassies in the region to evacuate non-essential personnel.
By Parisa Hafezi and Angus McDowall
DUBAI, March 7 (Reuters) - Iran's hierarchy is showing signs of fracturing over a war its leaders see as existential, with angry divisions between hardliners and more pragmatic factions laid bare by a row over President Masoud Pezeshkian's promise not to strike Gulf states.
Fissures within Iran's ruling elite were long suppressed under the iron rule of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, but his killing a week ago has allowed them to spill out into the open as U.S. and Israeli strikes pile pressure on Tehran.
Turkey's foreign minister advised Saturday against efforts to cause a civil war inside Iran, while warning Tehran after NATO intercepted a Turkey-bound ballistic missile launched from Iran this week.
Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said any effort to stir up a civil war inside Iran in a bid to bring about regime change would be a "historic" mistake.
"We are against all scenarios that aim to instigate a civil war in Iran, that target ethnic or religious fault lines," Fidan told journalists in Istanbul.
"This is the most dangerous scenario," he added.
By Nandita Bose, Sarah Morland and David Brunnstrom
MIAMI, Florida, March 7 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump welcomed Latin American leaders to Florida on Saturday to launch a new coalition against drug cartels, even as he struck a dismissive tone toward the region, telling officials their countries had allowed gangs to seize territory and joking that he had no time to learn their languages.
March 7 (Reuters) - More than 150 Iranian nationals, including diplomats and their families, left Lebanon on Saturday, a senior Lebanese security source told Reuters, after an Israeli military spokesperson threatened "representatives" of Iran in Lebanon.
RAMALLAH, West Bank, March 7 (Reuters) - An Israeli settler shot dead a 27-year-old Palestinian man in the occupied West Bank on Saturday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.
The man was killed in the village area of Masafer Yatta, near the Palestinian city of Hebron, according to the Health Ministry and the official Palestinian news agency WAFA.
The Israeli military said the shooter was a reserve soldier who arrived at the scene after receiving a report of confrontations between settlers and Palestinians. The incident was being investigated, the military said.
By Maya Gebeily, Humeyra Pamuk and Alexander Cornwell
BEIRUT/WASHINGTON/TEL AVIV, March 7 (Reuters) - Israel and Iran traded attacks as the Middle East war entered a second week on Saturday, while Tehran made an unusual apology to neighbouring states, apparently seeking to calm regional anger at Iranian strikes on Gulf civilian targets.
"I personally apologise to neighbouring countries that were affected by Iran’s actions,” Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said, urging them not to join U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran.
