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White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt takes questions during a news briefing in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House on March 25, 2026 in Washington, DC.

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Iranian Foreign Minister Araghchi says Iran did not plan to negotiate with US, adds Tehran intends to keep fighting, after US President Trump said Washington had proposed a peace plan.



All you need to know about Day 26 of US-Israeli war on Iran

PARIS: Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of late Iranian supreme leader Ali Khamenei, has been appointed to succeed his father as the new head of the Islamic Republic. The younger Khamenei was named supreme leader by the top clerical body the Assembly of Experts in a statement published shortly after midnight on Monday in Iran. Other contenders for the top position had included Alireza Arafi, one of the three members of the interim council running the country, hardliner Mohsen Araki, and even Hassan Khomeini, the grandson of the founder of the Islamic republic in 1979. But ultimately the assembly settled on Mojtaba Khamenei, 56, opting for the kind of hereditary transition that his father had rejected on principle in 2024. The Islamic revolution had put an end to a multi-century royal dynasty headed by the shah. Born on September 8, 1969, in the holy city of Mashhad in eastern Iran, Mojtaba Khamenei is one of six children of the late supreme leader. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was martyred aged 86 just over a week ago in Tehran during the first wave of US-Israeli air strikes that triggered the war in the Middle East. Because of his discretion at official ceremonies and in the media, Mojtaba Khamenei&#39;s true influence has been the subject of intense speculation for years among the Iranian population as well as in diplomatic circles. He is the only child of the former supreme leader to hold a public position, despite having no official post. The cleric, who has a salt-and-pepper beard and the black turban of the &quot;seyyed,&quot; descendants of the Prophet Mohammed, has been presented by some as acting behind the scenes to pull strings at the heart of power in Iran. He is regarded as close to conservatives, notably because of his ties with the Revolutionary Guards, the ideological arm of the Islamic republic&#39;s military. That relationship dates back to his service in a combat unit at the end of the war between Iraq and Iran that lasted from 1980 to 1988. Security force links&nbsp;The US Treasury Department imposed sanctions on Mojtaba Khamenei in 2019 during President Donald Trump&#39;s first term, saying he represented the supreme leader &quot;despite never being elected or appointed to a government position aside from work in the office of his father.&rdquo; Ali Khamenei had &quot;delegated a part of his leadership responsibilities&quot; to his son, &quot;who worked closely&quot; with Iranian security forces &quot;to advance his father&#39;s destabilizing regional ambitions and oppressive domestic objectives,&quot; the Treasury said. Opponents have notably accused him of playing a role in the violent crackdown that followed the re-election of ultra-conservative president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2009, which triggered a vast protest movement. According to an investigation by the Bloomberg news organization, which cited anonymous sources and Western intelligence agency reports, Mojtaba Khamenei has amassed wealth estimated at more than $100 million. Money from oil sales had been channeled into investments in luxury British real estate, hotels in Europe and property in Dubai through shell companies in tax havens, according to the investigation. On the religious front, Mojtaba Khamenei studied theology in the holy city of Qom, south of Tehran, where he also taught. He attained the rank of Hujjat al-Islam, a title given to mid-ranking clerics, below that of Ayatollah held by his father and by revolutionary leader Ruhollah Khomeini. His wife, Zahra Haddad-Adel, daughter of a former speaker of parliament, also died in the US-Israeli strikes that killed the supreme leader, according to Iranian authorities. Israel has issued a stark warning to the new supreme leader and whoever selected him, saying &quot;the hand of the State of Israel will continue to follow any successor and anyone who seeks to appoint a successor.&quot; The Assembly of Experts has 88 members who are elected every eight years. It has only overseen one leadership transition process to date, when Khamenei was selected in 1989 following the death of Khomeini.

Mojtaba's true influence has been the subject of intense speculation for years among the Iranian population as well as in diplomatic circles; he is the only child of the former supreme leader to hold a public position, despite having no official post.


Mojtaba Khamenei: Who is Iran's new Supreme Leader

Iran reports no radioactive leak at Natanz nuclear site after US-Israeli strikes; Israeli attacks displace 58,000 in Lebanon; Russia urges de-escalation; explosions heard in Gulf cities; Trump claims Iran’s capabilities largely destroyed

All you need to know about Day 4 of US-Israeli war on Iran

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ISLAMABAD: Iran&#39;s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed Saturday in joint US-Israeli airstrikes, fracturing the international community between condemnation and celebration. ChinaAccording to China&#39;s Foreign Ministry, the killing of Khamenei constituted &quot;a serious violation of Iran&#39;s sovereignty and security&quot; and a direct trampling on the purposes and principles of the UN Charter and basic norms of international relations. The ministry called for the &quot;immediate halting of military operations&quot; and urged all parties to return to dialogue. In a direct call with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi described the killing of the leader of a sovereign country as categorically unacceptable under international law, as reported by China&#39;s state-run Xinhua News Agency.&nbsp; He specifically condemned the timing of the strikes, stating it was unacceptable for the US and Israel to launch attacks on Iran while Washington and Tehran were still engaged in active nuclear negotiations. Wang outlined China&#39;s three-point position: an immediate cessation of military operations, a prompt return to dialogue and negotiations, and joint opposition to what Beijing characterized as unlawful unilateral actions.&nbsp; The Chinese foreign minister also expressed concern that the strikes were aimed at forcing regime change, something China regards as a fundamental violation of state sovereignty and the UN Charter&#39;s non-interference principle. Russia Russian President Vladimir Putin sent a formal message of condolences to Tehran, calling Khamenei &quot;an outstanding statesman&quot; who had made an enormous personal contribution to Russian-Iranian ties.&nbsp; As per the Kremlin&#39;s official statement, Putin described the killing as committed in &quot;cynical violation of all norms of human morality and international law&quot; and conveyed his &quot;most sincere sympathy and support&quot; to Khamenei&#39;s family, as well as to the Iranian leadership and people. Kremlin called the strikes as an extension of a pattern of &ldquo;Western disregard&rdquo; for sovereignty and &ldquo;international law.&rdquo; Russian state media reported that Moscow was closely monitoring the situation and would continue consultations with regional and global partners in the coming days. United States President Donald Trump called Khamenei &quot;one of the most evil people in history&quot; and described his death as &quot;justice for the people of Iran&quot; and for Americans harmed by his regime. Trump urged Iranians to &quot;seize control of your destiny&quot; and &quot;take back their country,&quot; framing the moment as a rare opening for revolution. The administration announced that &quot;heavy and pinpoint bombing&quot; would continue throughout the week or longer. Trump warned Iran that further retaliatory strikes would be met with &quot;force that has never been seen before.&quot; At the UN Security Council, US Ambassador Mike Waltz dismissed legal objections from Iran&#39;s representative, invoking Article 51 of the UN Charter to justify the strikes as lawful acts of self-defense.&nbsp; According to the US Mission to the United Nations, Waltz cited 47 years of Iranian hostility, including alleged assassination attempts against Trump himself. He closed by suggesting the Iranian people would &quot;finally be free.&quot; United Nations: &#39;Region on the brink&#39;Meanwhile, UN Secretary-General Guterres condemned both the US-Israeli strikes and Iran&#39;s retaliatory attacks, calling for an immediate ceasefire. He told the Security Council that an airstrike killed at least 85 people at a girls&#39; school in Minab and warned that military escalation risked &quot;igniting a chain of events that no one can control.&quot; Guterres expressed regret that a third round of indirect US-Iran talks mediated by Oman had just concluded, with technical talks in Vienna scheduled for the following week. &quot;This opportunity for diplomacy has been squandered,&quot; he said. T&uuml;rkiye: &#39;Ring of fire&#39;President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan condemned the strikes as a &quot;clear violation of Iran&#39;s sovereignty&quot; while also calling Iran&#39;s retaliatory strikes on Gulf states &quot;unacceptable.&quot; He warned that the region faces the risk of being &quot;dragged into a ring of fire&quot; unless diplomacy prevails. Erdoğan said he had spoken personally with both Trump and Iranian President Pezeshkian before the strikes began but was unable to prevent them, citing a &quot;crisis of confidence&quot; between the parties and ongoing Israeli efforts to undermine the process.&nbsp; According to a statement from Turkey&#39;s Directorate of Communications, Erdoğan pledged to intensify diplomatic engagements to secure a ceasefire and facilitate a return to the negotiating table.

Allies condemn US-Israeli strikes on Iran as Washington celebrates, calls for regime change, and warns of further bombing.

From condemnation to celebration: World reacts to Khamenei’s death

WASHINGTON: US envoy Steve Witkoff said on Saturday that President Donald Trump is questioning why Iran has not &quot;capitulated&quot; in the face of Washington&#39;s military build-up aimed at pressuring them into a nuclear deal. The United States and Iran this week resumed Oman-mediated talks in Geneva aimed at averting the possibility of military action, after Washington dispatched two <a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/us-aircraft-carrier-enters-mediterranean-as-trump-mulls-iran-strikes" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">aircraft carriers</a>, jets and weaponry to the region to back its warnings. In a Fox News interview with Trump&#39;s daughter-in-law Lara, Witkoff said the president was &quot;curious&quot; about Iran&#39;s position after he had warned them of severe consequences in the event they failed to strike a deal. &lsquo;He&rsquo;s curious&rsquo;&nbsp;&quot;I don&#39;t want to use the word &#39;frustrated,&#39; because he understands he has plenty of alternatives, but he&#39;s curious as to why they haven&#39;t... I don&#39;t want to use the word &#39;capitulated,&#39; but why they haven&#39;t capitulated,&quot; he said. &quot;Why, under this pressure, with the amount of seapower and naval power over there, why haven&#39;t they come to us and said, &#39;We profess we don&#39;t want a weapon, so here&#39;s what we&#39;re prepared to do&#39;? And yet it&#39;s sort of hard to get them to that place.&quot; Meeting with Reza Pahlavi&nbsp;The US envoy also confirmed in the interview that he had met with Reza Pahlavi, who has not returned to Iran since before the 1979 Islamic Revolution that ousted the monarchy. &quot;I met him at the direction of the president,&quot; he said, without providing further details. US-based Pahlavi last week told a crowd in Munich that he was ready to lead the country to a &quot;secular democratic future&quot; after Trump said regime change would be best for the country. Draft proposal for agreement&nbsp; Witkoff&#39;s comments come after Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said a <a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/iran-to-submit-draft-nuclear-proposal-as-us-military-presence-grows" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">draft proposal</a> for an agreement with Washington would be ready in a matter of days. Trump said on Thursday that Iran had at most 15 days to make a deal on concerns starting with its nuclear program. As talks between the two nations continued in Geneva, Iran&#39;s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Tuesday said that Trump would not succeed in destroying the Islamic republic. Sanctions &nbsp;Western countries accuse the Islamic Republic of seeking to acquire nuclear weapons, which Tehran denies, though it insists on its right to enrichment for civilian purposes. Iran, for its part, is seeking to negotiate an end to sanctions that have proven to be a massive drag on its economy, which played a role in sparking anti-government protests in December.

The US and Iran this week resumed Oman-mediated talks in Geneva aimed at averting the possibility of military action, after Washington dispatched two aircraft carriers, jets and weaponry to the region to back its warnings.

Articles tagged with "Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei"

All you need to know about Day 26 of US-Israeli war on Iran

Mojtaba Khamenei: Who is Iran's new Supreme Leader

All you need to know about Day 4 of US-Israeli war on Iran

From condemnation to celebration: World reacts to Khamenei’s death

US envoy says Trump questioning why Iran has not 'capitulated'