Regional
Commandos rescue 2 children from dangling cable car in Pakistan

Army commandos dangling from helicopters plucked two children from a broken cable car suspended hundreds of meters above a canyon Tuesday in a remote part of Pakistan, the military said. Four more children and two adults still awaited rescue as night fell.
The military said in a statement that the rescue mission was still underway. Footage on TV stations showed a child in a harness being pulled to safety. The commandos’ rope could be seen swaying in the wind against the mountainous landscape Associated Press reported.
An expert described the rescue as extremely delicate because the wind generated by the helicopter blades could further weaken the remaining cables holding the car aloft.
Relatives of those trapped prayed while anxiously watching the operation unfold. The rescue also transfixed the country as Pakistanis crowded around televisions in offices, shops, restaurants and hospitals.
According to Pakistani TV stations, some of those trapped were in contact with their families by cellphone. Authorities said the two adults were consoling the children, who were between the ages of 11 and 15.
One of the cables snapped while the eight passengers were crossing a river canyon Tuesday morning in Battagram district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. The children had been on their way to school.
Villagers frequently use cable cars to get around Pakistan’s mountainous regions. But the cars are often poorly maintained, and every year people die or are injured while traveling in them.
Helicopters were sent to attempt to pluck the people from the cable car but only after the group spent six hours precariously suspended 350 meters above ground, according to Taimoor Khan, a spokesman for the disaster management authority.
Pakistan’s caretaker prime minister, Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar, wrote on X that he ordered authorities “to urgently ensure safe rescue and evacuation” of the eight people.
“I have also directed the authorities to conduct safety inspections of all such private chairlifts and ensure that they are safe to operate and use,” he said on the platform formerly known as Twitter.
Several helicopters hovered above the scene, and ambulances gathered on the ground.
Tipu Sultan, a retired army brigadier and defense expert, warned that the helicopters themselves could make the situation worse but that the commandos would be well aware of that risk. Khan added that the pilots were flying “carefully.”
“Let us pray that those trapped in the cable car are safely rescued,” Sultan said.
Regional
Mohammed bin Salman says Saudi Arabia is getting ‘closer’ to Israel normalization

Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said in a U.S. television interview that his country was moving steadily closer to normalizing relations with Israel and also warned that if Iran gets a nuclear weapon, “we have to get one.”
“Every day we get closer,” the crown prince told Fox News in wide-ranging remarks broadcast on Wednesday, when asked to characterize talks aimed at long-time foes Israel and Saudi Arabia reaching a landmark agreement to open diplomatic relations, Reuters reported.
The conservative U.S. network’s interview with the crown prince, widely known as MbS, comes as President Joe Biden’s administration presses ahead with an effort to broker historic ties between the two regional powerhouses, Washington’s top Middle East allies.
The normalization talks are the centerpiece of complex negotiations that also include discussions of U.S. security guarantees and civilian nuclear help that Riyadh has sought, as well as possible Israeli concessions to the Palestinians.
“For us, the Palestinian issue is very important. We need to solve that part,” MbS, Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, said when asked what it would take to get a normalization agreement. “And we have a good negotiations strategy til now.”
“We got to see where we go. We hope that will reach a place that will ease the life of the Palestinians and get Israel as a player in the Middle East,” he said, speaking in English.
MbS also voiced concern about the possibility that Iran, a mutual adversary of Saudi Arabia and Israel that the U.S. wants to contain, could obtain a nuclear weapon. Tehran has denied seeking a nuclear bomb.
“That’s a bad move,” he said. “If you use it, you got to have a big fight with the rest of the world.”
Asked what would happen if Iran did get a nuclear bomb, MbS said: “If they get one, we have to get one, for security reasons and the balance of power in the Middle East. But we don’t want to see that.”
Regional
US and Iran to swap detainees after $6 billion unfrozen

A Qatari plane waited in Iran on Monday to fly out five U.S. detainees in a swap for five Iranians held in the United States, thanks to a Doha-mediated deal that has also unfrozen $6 billion of Iranian funds.
Iran and the United States were told the funds had been transferred to accounts in Qatar, a source briefed on the matter told Reuters. That triggered an exchange sequence agreed after months of talks between the arch foes, who are at odds over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions and a host of other issues.
“A Qatari aircraft is on standby in Iran waiting to fly five soon-to-be released U.S. citizens and two relatives to Doha on Monday morning,” the source said.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani said the funds, blocked in South Korea after U.S. sanctions on Iran were hardened in 2018, would be available to Tehran on Monday. Under the deal, Qatar will ensure it is spent on humanitarian goods, Reuters reported.
There was no immediate public U.S. comment.
The five Americans with dual nationality are expected to fly on from Doha to the United States. In return, five Iranians detained in the U.S. will be released.
The Iranian Foreign ministry spokesperson said two Iranians would return to Iran while two would stay in the U.S. at their request. One detainee would join his family in a third country, he added.
The deal will remove a major irritant between the U.S., which brands Tehran a state sponsor of terrorism, and Iran, which calls Washington the “Great Satan”.
But they remain deeply divided on other issues ranging from Iran’s nuclear programme and its influence around the region to U.S. sanctions and America’s military presence in the Gulf.
Qatar, a tiny but hugely wealthy Gulf Arab energy producer, has sought to raise its global profile, hosting the soccer World Cup last year and carving out a role in international diplomacy. The Sunni Muslim nation hosts a big U.S. military base but has also forged close ties with Shi’ite Muslim Iran.
Doha hosted at least eight rounds of talks with Iranian and U.S. negotiators sitting in separate hotels, speaking via shuttle diplomacy, a source previously told Reuters.
Qatar’s monitoring role
Under the agreement, Doha agreed to monitor how Iran spends the unfrozen funds to ensure the cash is spent on humanitarian goods, such as food and medicine, and not any items under U.S. sanctions.
The transfer of Iran’s funds has drawn criticism from U.S. Republicans who say Biden, a Democrat, is in effect paying a ransom for U.S. citizens. The White House has defended the deal.
The U.S. dual citizens to be released include Siamak Namazi, 51, and Emad Sharqi, 59, both businessmen, and Morad Tahbaz, 67, an environmentalist who also holds British nationality. They were released from prison and put under house arrest last month, Reuters reported.
A fourth U.S. citizen was also released into house arrest, while a fifth was already under house arrest. Their identities have not been disclosed.
Iranian officials have named the five Iranians to be released by the U.S. as Mehrdad Moin-Ansari, Kambiz Attar-Kashani, Reza Sarhangpour-Kafrani, Amin Hassanzadeh and Kaveh Afrasiabi. Two Iranian officials previously said that Afrasiabi would remain in the United States but had not mentioned others.
Ties between Washington and Tehran have been boiling since Donald Trump, a Republican, pulled the U.S. out of a nuclear deal between Iran and global powers when he was president in 2018. Reaching another nuclear deal has gained little traction since, as President Joe Biden prepares for the 2024 U.S. election.
As a first step in the deal, Washington waived sanctions to allow the transfer of $6 billion in Iranian funds from South Korea to Qatar. The funds were blocked in South Korea, normally one of Iran’s largest oil customers, when Washington imposed sweeping financial sanctions on Tehran and the cash could not be transferred.
Regional
Iran’s security forces briefly detain Mahsa Amini’s father

The father of Mahsa Amini was briefly detained on Saturday, human rights groups said, amid a heavy security force presence on the first anniversary of his daughter’s death in Iranian police custody that sparked months of anti-government protests.
Amjad Amini was warned against marking the anniversary of his daughter’s death before being released, the Kurdistan Human Rights Network said. Iran’s official IRNA news agency denied that Amjad Amini was arrested, but it did not say if he was briefly detained or warned.
Earlier, social media and reports by rights groups spoke of security forces taking up positions around Amini’s home in Saqez, in western Iran, Reuters reported.
The death of the 22-year-old Kurdish woman in the custody of the morality police last year for allegedly flouting the Islamic Republic’s mandatory dress code triggered months of protests that represented the biggest show of opposition to the authorities in years.
Many called for an end to more than four decades of Shi’ite clerical rule.
According to social media posts, Amini’s parents had said in a statement earlier this week that, despite government warnings, they would hold a “traditional and religious anniversary ceremony” at their 22-year-old daughter’s grave in Saqez.
A massive security force presence was deployed in Iran’s mostly Kurdish areas on Saturday in anticipation of unrest, according to human rights groups.
Widespread strikes were also reported in multiple cities in Iran’s Kurdistan region.
However, IRNA said Amini’s hometown of Saqez was “completely quiet” and that calls for strike in Kurdish areas had failed due to “people’s vigilance and the presence of security and military forces”.
It quoted an official in the Kurdistan province as saying: “A number of agents affiliated with counter-revolutionary groups who had planned to create chaos and prepare media fodder were arrested in the early hours of this morning.”
In the protests that followed Amini’s death more than 500 people, including 71 minors, were killed, hundreds injured and thousands arrested, rights groups said. Iran carried out seven executions linked to the unrest.
In a report last month, Amnesty International said Iranian authorities “have been subjecting victims’ families to arbitrary arrest and detention, imposing cruel restrictions on peaceful gatherings at grave sites, and destroying victims’ gravestones”.
Many journalists, lawyers, activists, students, academics, artists, public figures and members of ethnic minorities accused of links with the protest wave, as well as relatives of protesters killed in the unrest, have been arrested, summoned, threatened or fired from jobs in the past few weeks, according to Iranian and Western human rights groups.
Iran’s Etemad daily reported in August that the lawyer for Amini’s family also faced charges of “propaganda against the system”. If convicted, Saleh Nikbakht faces a jail sentence of between one and three years.
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