live G7 Calls For Halt To Attacks On Civilian Infrastructure

Saudi Arabia's foreign minister on March 19 said the kingdom "reserves the right" to act militarily against Iran after Riyadh was targeted by Iranian ballistic missiles.

Prince Faisal bin Farhan told a news conference that any trust with Tehran has ⁠been shattered and that pressure from Iran will "backfire" as the Islamic republic continues to retaliate for the US-Israeli air strikes with missile and drone launches against Gulf Arab states.

Tehran accused Israel of striking its facilities in the huge South Pars gas field on ⁠March 18 in a major escalation in the war. Iran has vowed to attack oil and gas targets throughout the Gulf, immediately firing missiles at Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

In the harshest comments to come out of the Saudis since the start of thte war, the foreign minister accused Iran ⁠of hostile actions against its neighbors -- directly and through its many regional proxies.

He said the most recent attacks had been long planned by Tehran and were not in reaction to the South Pars attack.

"This pressure from Iran will backfire politically and morally and certainly we reserve the right to take military actions if deemed necessary," Farhan told reporters following a meeting of the region's top diplomats in Riyadh.

Interceptors were fired from near the Riyadh hotel where the conference was held around the time ‌foreign ministers from about a dozen countries -- including Turkey, the UAE, Jordan, Qatar, and Syria -- gathered for a meeting on the Iran war.

With reporting by Reuters

French President Emmanuel Macron called for a suspension of attacks on oil and gas facilities in the Middle East, following talks with US President Donald Trump and the Qatari emir, Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani. "It is in our common interest to implement, without delay, a moratorium on strikes targeting civilian infrastructure, particularly energy and water supply facilities," Macron said on X. "Civilian populations and their essential needs, as well as the security of energy supplies, must be protected from military escalation," he added. The French president said he had spoken with Al Thani and Trump "following the strikes that hit gas production facilities in Iran and Qatar" on March 18. US and Israeli air strikes have hit Iranian targets, while Tehran has retaliated with launches against energy infrastructure in the region.

Israeli media are reporting that the country's air force has targeted Iranian naval vessels in the Caspian Sea for the first time.

The TV channel N12 on March 19 described an "unusual attack" in the northern Iranian port city of Bandar, citing Israeli security sources.

The news website ynet and broadcaster Kan 11 also are reporting an attack by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) on Iranian naval targets.

Israel's military did not immediately comment on the reports, although the IDF said it had struck sites in northern Iran for the first time.

US President Donald Trump recently said the US military had destroyed Iran's entire navy.

Iran's Northern Fleet is based in Bandar Anzali.

N12 quoted a security source as saying, "We attacked an Iranian naval vessel, this is a dramatic event."

This is the first time the Israeli military has attacked the Iranian navy on such a distant site -- some 1,300 kilometers from Israel -- the report cited officials as saying.

Iran has executed a Swedish citizen, the Foreign Ministry in Stockholm said on March 18, prompting condemnation from Sweden and EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas.

Swedish officials did not name the person, who had been arrested in June of 2025.

But earlier, the Mizan Online news agency, which is run by Iran's judiciary, said a man named Kouroush Keyvani was executed for spying for Israel. It said he was arrested during Iran's 12-day war with Israel in June 2025.

Keyvani, an Iranian national, had also obtained Swedish citizenship in 2019.

Sweden had repeatedly ‌raised his case with Tehran, Foreign Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard said.

Since his arrest, "we have done everything in our power to try to change this situation. We have been in contact at various levels, both in Stockholm and in Tehran," Stenergard said.

"The death penalty is an inhumane, cruel, and irreversible punishment. Sweden, together with the rest of the EU, condemns its application in all circumstances," she said.

She added that legal ‌proceedings leading up to the execution did not meet the standards of due process.

Kallas said: "The appalling human rights situation in Iran and the alarming increase ‌in executions are intolerable and show the regime's true colors."

Keyvani was the third person executed by Iran on espionage charges this year. The Norway-based Iran Human Rights monitoring group said at least 13 people were executed last year on spying-related charges.

Western governments and rights groups of soundly condemned Tehran for executions carried out after questionable legal proceedings.

Iran executed more than 2,500 people in 2025 for various crimes in what the UN human rights watchdog called a "dramatic escalation" and Amnesty International called a "horrifying assault" on the right to life.

The Save the Children aid organization said the war in Iran has disrupted transport of crucial medical supplies for more than 400,000 children.

"The conflict in the Middle East and wider region is obstructing key delivery routes for humanitarian supplies, delaying life-saving medical shipments for at least 410,000 children in three countries" and "the global impact will only grow," it said in a statement.

"The escalating conflict is having dire ripple effects on global aid supplies due to disruptions to key air, sea, and land routes, with shipping costs estimated by Save the Children to skyrocket about 10-50 percent to reroute aid in some cases," it added.

Aid deliveries hit by the delays were set for delivery to families in Sudan, Yemen, and Afghanistan, the organization added.

It said that a consignment for Sudan is currently stuck in the United Arab Emirates because the crucial Strait of Hormuz is almost completely blocked to shipping.

A separate shipment destined for Yemen is stuck in Dubai and now will have to be transported by land.

"Lifesaving aid is being delayed around the world, costs are soaring as a result of the fuel price increases at a time when governments are cutting vital foreign aid budgets, and families in some of the world’s most fragile places risk losing the support they depend on," said Willem Zuidema, the organization's global supply chain director.

Messages attributed to Mojtaba Khamenei have responded to the recent killings of senior Iranian figures.

RFE/RL's Radio Farda reports that Iranian media have published two written messages they said were from Mojtaba Khamenei, the country’s newly appointed supreme leader, expressing condolences over the deaths of leading officials, including Ali Larijani, secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, and Gholamreza Soleimani, head of the Basij pro-government militia.

One message published on his Telegram account, according to Reuters, warned that Iran was likely to retaliate, saying "every drop of spilled blood comes at a price, and the criminal murderers of these martyrs will soon have to pay it,"

Since being named as the Islamic republic's third supreme leader on March 8, no images or recordings of Khamenei have been released, with only written statements circulated by state media.

US President Donald Trump said this week that it was unclear whether Khamenei was alive, while Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth suggested he may have been “badly disfigured.”

Gregory Brew, a historian of Iranian oil and a senior analyst at Eurasia Group, has been speaking to RFE/RL's Radio Farda about the air strikes on the South Pars field. According to him the development could signal a potential shift in targeting.

“The attack...indicates Israel’s willingness to hit aspects of Iran’s energy infrastructure, and then, of course, Iran’s willingness to retaliate against other energy targets," he said.

It's unclear if "Israel is going to start targeting energy infrastructure more broadly -- this could be a warning shot, a prelude to a more significant campaign," he added.

He noted that it is also uncertain whether Iran’s retaliation against Persian Gulf energy targets would be sufficient to deter further attacks, given that its capabilities have been degraded.

"We will have to wait and see but this does suggest that without de-escalation , likely led by President Trump, this war is going to continue and could very well escalate to a point where energy becomes a more prominent target," he said.

Following an attack on the South Pars gas field on March 18, subsequent incidents have disrupted energy infrastructure across the Middle East.

The strike on South Pars -- which is shared by Iran and Qatar -- caused fires and reduced output at the world’s largest gas reserve, prompting Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps to warn Persian Gulf states to evacuate key oil and gas facilities, including Qatar’s main gas hub Ras Laffan.

Qatar later reported a fire at Ras Laffan after an alleged Iranian attack, with emergency crews deployed to contain the blaze.

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia said it intercepted ballistic missiles targeting Riyadh and destroyed a drone heading toward a gas facility, with no reported casualties.

The fallout has also affected Iraq, where authorities confirmed on March 18 that gas imports from Iran have been completely halted, creating a 3,100-megawatt shortfall in Iraq's electricity grid.

The crisis has been compounded by disruptions to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, which have hindered regional oil and gas exports.

Iraqi and Kurdistan regional authorities, however, have since partially resumed exports of crude oil from Kirkuk fields in the north of the country via Turkey’s Ceyhan port.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez says that the war in the Middle East would not distract his country from supporting Ukraine in its defense against Russia’s invasion.

"We cannot deny that the crisis in the Middle East is monopolizing conversation ‌and precisely for that reason, I want to say to the government of Ukraine that nothing and no one ‌will make us forget what is happening ‌in Ukraine," Sanchez ‌said at a joint press conference with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Madrid on March 18.

“We will keep our support for the Ukrainian people with the same intensity,” he added.

A day earlier, Zelenskyy told the BBC he had a “very bad feeling” about the impact of the Middle East conflict on the war in Ukraine, saying peace negotiations were being “constantly postponed” due to “one reason -- war in Iran.”

High oil prices? Check. Fewer US weapons for Kyiv? Check. Washington distracted from the ongoing war on Ukraine? Check. Europe nervous about energy costs? Check. Tensions in the West? Check.

Nearly three weeks into the furious campaign of US and Israeli air strikes, the Tehran government -- Russia’s closest partner in the Middle East is being shoved toward collapse, regional politics have been scrambled and Moscow has been left watching, largely helplessly, from the sidelines.

The Kremlin isn’t entirely unhappy, though.

“I do think that it complicates the security and the economic picture for Europe. And it distracts [US President Donald] Trump from Ukraine, and all of that will feel like it gives a lot of extra room to Moscow,” said Sam Greene, a longtime Russia expert and professor of Russian politics at King's College London.

European policymakers “might begin to shift their willingness to support Ukraine and to maintain their stance on Russia,” he told RFE/RL. “It’s that sort of thing that blows wind into [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s sails.”

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