Damien McElroy

1 week ago | thenationalnews.com | Damien McElroy

British MPs have told Iran's ambassador to the UK that his country must strike a nuclear deal and agree to give up advanced uranium enrichment as the price of peace. Seyed Ali Mousavi's appearance at the Foreign Affairs Select committee was both sombre and tense with police in body armour providing an escort and a boycott of the session by the Israeli ambassador.

1 week ago | thenationalnews.com | Damien McElroy

As a clandestine enterprise, Iran’s nuclear programme was always as much about the scientists inside it as the leadership behind it. So it came as little surprise that the name Fereydoon Abbasi was on the target list when Israel launched its offensive against the programme last week. Abbasi had a distinguished career, which included a stint as head of the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran. In a TV panel appearance not so long ago, he sounded sanguine about the known threat to his life.

2 weeks ago | thenationalnews.com | Damien McElroy

Blink and you would miss it. The entrance to the Sobha Realty Arsenal Training Ground is a cutaway in a high hedge running along a row of detached houses where the rolling English countryside meets the motorway network. A trailblazing centre that was bought and opened in the era of Arsene Wegner’s 2003-2004 Invincibles team, the 147-acre site north of London is also a jewel in the global ambitions of the Sobha Realty property empire.

2 weeks ago | thenationalnews.com | Damien McElroy

A tale of two corners. On one side that leads to Kiel town centre's main shopping precinct is a poster for Germany's first military veterans day taking place on Sunday. The slogan invites passers-by to Show Respect and reminds the former armed forces members that Once Connected, Always Together. On the other corner that leads to the bayside harbour wall is the anti-war slogan Kreig dem Kreig (war against war) scrawled in paint and red paint blotches cover the doorway.

2 weeks ago | thenationalnews.com | Thomas Harding |Damien McElroy |Thomas Helm

Several countries led by Britain have sanctioned two senior Israeli cabinet ministers, leading to a major diplomatic fallout. Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich will both face travel bans and financial restrictions from the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Norway. In an official statement, the British government said the pair were “now sanctioned for their repeated incitement of violence against Palestinian civilians, effective immediately”.