Aug 27 (Reuters) - Iran is preparing a list of conditions for reopening the Strait of Hormuz after mediators asked Tehran to set them out, said Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, adding that ending the regional war was among them.

Rezaei said Iran had agreed with Oman on a shipping corridor through the strait, with parts of the route in Omani waters and parts in Iranian waters. Ships would use a designated central channel if the U.S. met Iran's conditions, he said through an interpreter in an Al Manar TV interview.

BRUSSELS, Aug 27 (Reuters) - The Pentagon’s policy chief told NATO members on Thursday that the alliance must adapt and that he wants to hear from allies as part of a review of U.S. forces in Europe he said was meant to enable a more European-led defence of the continent.

Washington announced asix-month reviewof U.S. troop deployments in Europe in June and in recent weeks sent NATO members a questionnaire covering issues ranging from defense spending to strategy, procurement and support for U.S. foreign policy priorities.

DUBAI, Aug 27 (Reuters) - Iran's Security Chief Mohsen Rezaei said a report about a potential plot to assassinate U.S. President Donald Trump's youngest son is a lie, in an interview broadcast by Lebanon's Al Manar TV on Thursday.

The U.S. Secret Service said on Tuesday that it was aware of a video broadcast by Iranian state television discussing a potential plot to assassinate U.S. President Donald Trump's youngest son Barron Trump.

(Reporting by Elwely Elwelly, Editing by Franklin Paul)

WASHINGTON, Aug 27 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump said on Thursday that the United States is not talking with Iran as Washington focuses on punishing Tehran economically, vowing to penalize countries thatdo business with the Islamic Republic.

"We don't want to speak to them. We're not looking to meet or anything," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office.

Earlier in the day, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said the U.S. economic campaign would continue until Iran decides to negotiate meaningfully.

Piracy off the Horn of Africa has reached its highest levels since 2013, according to an AFP analysis based on data from the International Maritime Organization (IMO).

Iran has executed over 500 people so far this year after a new surge in hangings in recent days, despite President Donald Trump urging the Islamic republic to halt executions, a rights group said on Thursday.

At least 511 people have been executed so far in 2026, according to Norway-based NGO Iran Human Rights, including at least 29 people in connection with anti-government protests in January.

At least 16 women are among those executed and at least 13 "political prisoners" affiliated with banned opposition groups, it said.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, will go on trial before a US military court in June 2028, an official said Thursday.

The long-awaited trial of Mohammed and three other accused 9/11 plotters is scheduled to begin on June 5, 2028 at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a court spokesman said.

Iran's top diplomat met his Qatari counterpart on Thursday in Tehran for talks on the strategic Strait of Hormuz, as a US naval blockade squeezes oil supplies to Iran amid a domestic shortfall. 

The visit by Qatar's Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani follows a week of intense diplomacy in Iran involving separate meetings with Oman's top diplomat and senior Pakistani officials seeking ways to end the Middle East war and reopen Hormuz.

Ziva Sharp said her Jewish faith motivated her to travel from Jerusalem to the West Bank to stand up for Palestinians -- a commitment that led to her being set upon by fellow Israelis also professing to be driven by Judaism.

Sharp and around 30 other activists are part of a small movement of Israelis, many of them religious Jews, who periodically go to the occupied West Bank with a mission to protect Palestinians under growing assault by violent settlers.

SINGAPORE, Aug 27 (Reuters) - Shipping traffic at the Strait of Hormuz rose slightly even as a standoff persisted between the United States and Iran, data showed on Thursday, while the market monitored Iran-Oman talks about the waterway.

Visible commodity vessel transits at Hormuz totalled 10 on Wednesday, up slightly from eight on Tuesday, data from Kpler showed. This was below a 10-day moving average of about 15 vessels.