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French citizen Olivier Grondeau, detained by Iran since October 2022 on security charges but described by his family as an innocent tourist, has returned to France after being released, President Emmanuel Macron said Thursday.Iranian authorities allowed another French national, who was under house arrest in Iran for several months and has requested anonymity, to also leave the country, sources familiar with the case told AFP on Thursday.Macron vowed to do everything to ensure the release of two other French citizens still held by Iran, while several other European nationals remain behind bars in the Islamic republic.The moves come ahead of an approaching critical juncture in the decades-long standoff over the Iranian nuclear programme, with US President Donald Trump writing the leadership a letter urging more talks on the issue.Western countries have for years accused Iran of detaining their nationals on trumped-up charges in a policy of state hostage-taking to use them as bargaining chips to extract concessions.Grondeau, 34, “is free and with his loved ones”, Macron posted on X.He added that “our mobilisation will not weaken” to ensure the release of Cecile Kohler, a teacher, and her partner, Jacques Paris, who were detained in May 2022.They are accused of seeking to stir up labour protests, accusations their families have denied.Grondeau arrived in France on Monday evening, the Elysee Palace and a diplomatic source told AFP. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot wrote on X he had been “held hostage in Iran for 887 days”.- ‘Pressure on Iran’ -No further details on the circumstances of Grondeau’s release were made available. There were also no further details in the case of the second national who had been held under house arrest. Exiled Iranian opposition group the People’s Mujahedin (MEK), which is outlawed by Tehran, meanwhile alleged that Grondeau’s release has been linked to an article that appeared this week in French media accusing its leader Maryam Rajavi of lavish spending at a spa resort.The piece in satirical weekly Canard Enchaine was “demonisation and character assassination”, Shahin Ghobadi, spokesman of the MEK’s political wing the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), told AFP.”There is clearly a quid-pro-quo and this is what Tehran gets in return,” he said.Speaking to TF1 television, Barrot denied France had given anything in return for the release of Grondeau which he said was the result of “continued pressure” on Iran.Grondeau, who is from Montpellier in the south of France, remains in hospital undergoing a battery of tests, having been severely weakened in recent months, particularly psychologically, a government source told AFP, asking not to be named.”It is a great joy to have Olivier back, since he is innocent of all charges and has always belonged among us,” his French lawyer, Chirinne Ardakani, told AFP.Grondeau, who turns 35 next week, was arrested in Shiraz, southern Iran, in October 2022 and sentenced to five years in prison for “conspiracy against the Islamic republic” including espionage.His family rejected the charges, describing Grondeau as a passionate fan of Persian poetry who went to Iran on a tourist visa as part of a world tour.- ‘Dying slow death’ -Until earlier this year, Grondeau had been identified only by his first name but his full identity was revealed by his family in January. In an audio message aired by French media at the time, Grondeau said he and the other two French detainees in Iran were “exhausted” and their strength was “running out”.There has been growing concern over the health of the two other French citizens held by Iran, with Kohler’s family warning that they risked dying if they were not freed.”Cecile Kohler and Jacques Paris must be freed from Iranian prisons,” Macron said in his message.Ardakani, who also represents Kohler, said she was kept in a windowless cell of just eight square metres (86 square feet) “under continuous video surveillance” and had to sleep on the floor.They are “dying a slow death,” Cecile’s sister Noemie Kohler said in early March.Over half a dozen European nationals still known to be held include Iranian-Swedish academic Ahmadreza Djalali, who was arrested during a visit to Iran in April 2016 and sentenced to death in 2017 on charges of spying.Around 20 Westerners are held in Iran, a French diplomatic source, asking not to be named, told AFP on Thursday.

Hamas said it fired rockets at Israeli commercial hub Tel Aviv on Thursday in its first military response to the growing civilian death toll from Israel’s resumption of air and ground operations in Gaza.Israel said it had closed off the territory’s main north-south route as troops expanded the ground operations they resumed on Wednesday. Gaza’s civil defence agency said 504 people had been killed so far in the Israeli assault, including more than 190 children. Its previous death toll was at least 470.The armed wing of Hamas, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, said it fired rockets at Tel Aviv in response to Israel’s “massacres” of Gaza civilians.The Israeli army said it intercepted one projectile fired from Gaza and that two others struck an uninhabited area.After weeks of stalemate, Israel resumed its air campaign early Tuesday with a wave of deadly strikes that drew widespread condemnation. The offensive shattered a relative calm that had pervaded in the war-ravaged Palestinian territory since a ceasefire took hold on January 19.At the Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza, grieving families knelt by the bodies of their loved ones enveloped in blood-stained white shrouds.”We want a ceasefire! We want a ceasefire!” one of them, Mohammed Hussein, told AFPTV, appealing for the international community to stop the killing.”We are defenceless Palestinian people,” he added.On Thursday, the Israeli army banned traffic on the territory’s main north-south artery.Palestinians were seen fleeing south along Salaheddin Road near the Nusseirat refugee camp atop donkey-drawn carts piled high with belongings.”Over the past 24 hours, IDF soldiers have begun a targeted ground operation in the central and southern Gaza Strip in order to expand the security zone between the northern and southern parts,” army spokesman Avichay Adraee said on X.Movement along Salaheddin Road between the north and south of the Gaza Strip is prohibited “for your safety”, he said.”Instead, travel from northern Gaza to the south is possible via the Al-Rashid coastal road,” Adraee added, without spelling out whether that meant movement from south to north was banned.Asked by AFP for clarification, the army had no immediate comment.- ‘Inhumane ordeals’ -An official from Gaza’s Hamas-run interior ministry said the Israeli army had closed what it calls Netzarim Junction, on Salaheddin Road just south of Gaza City, on Wednesday evening.The official said Israeli tanks had deployed at the junction, where the road artery crosses Israel’s main supply route, “following the withdrawal of American special security forces yesterday (Wednesday) morning”. He was referring to American private security contractors deployed in February after the pullback of Israeli forces under the terms of the January ceasefire.The first stage of the ceasefire expired early this month amid deadlock over next steps.Israel rejected negotiations for a promised second stage, calling instead for the return of all of its remaining hostages under an extended first stage.That would have meant delaying talks on a lasting ceasefire, and was rejected by Hamas as an attempt to renegotiate the original deal.The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) on Thursday deplored “an endless unleashing of the most inhumane ordeals” on the people of Gaza since Israel resumed its military offensive.”Israeli Forces bombardment continues from air & sea for the third day,” Philippe Lazzarini wrote on X. “Under our daily watch, people in Gaza are again & again going through their worst nightmare.”Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called Israel’s latest strikes on Gaza a “catastrophic crime” and said the United States “shares responsiblity”.The war began with Hamas’s 2023 attack on Israel, which resulted in 1,218 deaths, mostly civilians, according to Israeli figures.Gaza’s civil defence agency had said on Wednesday that at least 470 people had been killed in the territory since Israel resumed its strikes.Among them was a worker for the UN Office for Project Services (UNOPS) who the Gaza health ministry said was killed in an Israeli strike on the agency’s headquarters in Deir el-Balah.British Foreign Secretary David Lammy called for a “transparent investigation” into the strike on the UN compound in which a UK citizen was among five wounded.The overall death toll in Gaza since the start of the war stands at 49,617, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.burs-dv/kir

Defending MotoGP world champion Jorge Martin, who suffered two pre-season crashes, said he hopes to be back for the fourth round of this year’s championship.The Spaniard has missed the opening two rounds and had announced that he would not race in Austin, Texas, on March 29 and 30. The next race is at Lusail, in Qatar on April 12 and 13.”I expect to be in Qatar, but only if it doesn’t pose any risks,” the Aprilia rider told Italian sports newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport published on Thursday.But, he added, “these are the timelines, and it would be a mistake to rush them” which “would risk making everything take even longer”.Martin missed almost all of pre-season testing after breaking his right hand and foot in a crash on the opening day of a session in Malaysia. In an update on social media late on Wednesday, he explained that he then suffered a second “big impact” crash training on a supermoto all-terrain racing bike as he prepared to return.Pointing to parts of his anatomy, he listed the injuries as: broken radius and scaphoid bones in his left wrist, four fractures of his left foot, and muscular injuries in his right ribs. Martin already trails six-time-world champion Marc Marquez, who has won both races and both sprints in his first season on a factory Ducati, by 74 points.”Marc winning is not something anyone could not have expected,” Martin told Gazzetta.But the 27-year-old said his recovery was going well.”It was a difficult time but now I start to see the light,” he said on social media.The Yamaha-Pramac team announced on Thursday that Portuguese rider Miguel Oliveira will miss Austin and be replaced by Spaniard Augusto Fernandez.Oliveira injured his left shoulder in a crash in the Sprint Race in Argentina on March 15 and missed the main race with heavy bruising to his collarbone.His Yamaha-Pramac team said on Thursday that the rider had returned home and “further examinations carried out in Portugal revealed a sternoclavicular dislocation with ligament damage”.Fernandez, the 2022 Moto2 World Champion, raced in MotoGP for two seasons with the French GasGas-Tech3 team, before becoming a reserve rider for Yamaha this year. 

France said Thursday one of its citizens detained in Iran has been released, leaving at least over half a dozen European passport holders still held in the country.Olivier Grondeau, 34, detained since October 2022 on security charges, arrived in France on Monday after an almost 900-day ordeal, the Elysee Palace and a diplomatic source told AFP.Human rights groups say those still in custody are being kept by Iran for use as bargaining chips in negotiations with foreign governments.The known prisoners may not include all those held, with many of those detained advised by their foreign ministries not to publicise cases in the hope they can be resolved behind the scenes.Around twenty Westerners are held in Iran, a French diplomatic source, asking not to be named, told AFP on Thursday.Here are the known prisoners:- Britain -British-Iranian activist Mehran Raoof was arrested in October 2020 on national security charges and sentenced to 10 years and eight months in jail, according to Amnesty International.He was held for months in solitary confinement in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison, where he managed to smuggle out a letter last year complaining of harsh treatment of dual nationals, Amnesty said.In February 2025 Iran charged the detained British couple Craig and Lindsay Foreman with espionage, accusing them of collaborating with Western intelligence services.The BBC has reported the couple are in their early 50s and were on a motorbike trip around the world when they were detained in January.Nasrin Roshan, an Iranian-British dual national, is currently serving a three-year prison sentence in Evin Prison after being convicted on national security charges.She was arrested on November 16, 2023 at Tehran’s international airport while attempting to leave Iran. The Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) said in March she was hospitalised after losing consciousness.- France -French teachers’ union official Cecile Kohler and her partner, Jacques Paris, were detained in May 2022 while sightseeing in Iran. They are accused of spying.Kohler’s sister Neomie has warned about the health of the pair warning they risk dying if they are not released.- Sweden -Iranian academic Ahmadreza Djalali, a resident of Sweden, was arrested during a visit to Iran in April 2016 and sentenced to death in 2017 on charges of spying for Israel’s Mossad.He was granted Swedish citizenship while in jail. His hanging was postponed but his family says he remains on death row.In March, Stockholm called for his immediate release on humanitarian grounds after receiving information on the deterioration of his health.The Swedish foreign ministry has also confirmed that Iran is holding another Swedish man, who is in his twenties and was arrested in January 2024.Swedish media reported that this man was the target of an international arrest warrant in connection with a deadly shootout in Sweden.

Embattled Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutchison Holdings, caught in a US-China spat over control of the Panama Canal, said on Thursday that profits fell 27 percent in 2024.CK Hutchison offloaded its global ports business outside China — including operations in the vital Central American canal — this month to a group led by giant asset …

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Istanbul’s powerful mayor, Ekrem Imamoglu, remained in police custody Thursday over graft and terror allegations after being held the day before, as his party called for more protests in Turkey’s largest city.Imamoglu is President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s main political rival and his detention came just days before the party was expected to name him as its candidate for the 2028 presidential election.Financial markets in Turkey fell shortly afterwards in what analysts said indicates investors’ serious concerns that the move was politically motivated.The leader of the main opposition CHP, of which the mayor is a member, is expected to address supporters outside Istanbul’s City Hall at 1730 GMT on Thursday, a party spokesman told AFP.University students also planned several demonstrations in the city.The governor has banned all protests in Istanbul for four days.Hundreds of police joined the pre-dawn raid on Imamoglu’s home in Istanbul on Wednesday, he posted on X before being taken away, with the authorities then blocking access to social networks.Access to the internet and social media was still slow early Thursday. Thousands of angry protesters gathered outside City Hall late on Wednesday, chanting slogans including “Erdogan, dictator!” and “Government, resign!”Already facing an array of legal battles, the two-time Istanbul mayor is now under investigation for “aiding and abetting a terrorist organisation” — namely the banned Kurdish militant group PKK.He is also being probed for “bribery, extortion, corruption, aggravated fraud, and illegally obtaining personal data for profit as part of a criminal organisation” along with around 100 other suspects.- Backlash -CHP leader Ozgur Ozel, who travelled from Ankara to Istanbul immediately after the mayor was held, branded it a “coup” as he attended Wednesday night’s protest.”Imamoglu’s only crime was that he was taking the lead in opinion polls,” he said alongside Imamoglu’s wife Dilek.  “His only crime was that he won the hearts of the people. His only crime was he would be the next president,” he added. Local media said the other suspects were being interrogated at police headquarters but that Imamoglu has not yet been questioned.Hamish Kinnear, a senior analyst with Verisk Maplecroft, a risk consultancy, said the arrest had sparked “a heightened risk of civil unrest, which the government appears to have anticipated by introducing a four-day ban on protests in Istanbul.”The analyst warned Imamoglu’s detention could spoil the government plans to change the constitution so that Erdogan can run another term. “If Imamoglu’s arrest unites the opposition and provokes a political backlash, it could upset the government’s plan to push through constitutional change that would enable Erdogan to run for a third term,” he said. Under the constitution, Erdogan — who has been president for more than a decade — cannot run again for the presidency. He already changed the constitution to introduce the presidential system after serving as prime minister for 11 years.The Turkish lira fell sharply against the dollar after Imamoglu’s detention, trading at 37.99 on Thursday morning.