• Trump considers range of options, including military action against Iran.
• Iran warns it will strike US military and shipping targets if attacked.
• Trump to meet senior advisers on Tuesday to discuss Iran options.

The situation in Iran is “under total control” after violence linked to protests spiked over the weekend, the country’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said on Monday via English translation.

“We are ready for war but also for dialogue,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said on Monday in a briefing to foreign ambassadors in Tehran via English translation.

He added that Trump’s warning against Tehran of action should protests turn bloody had motivated “terrorists” to target protesters and security forces in order to invite foreign intervention.

FM Araqchi’s response came after Trump said that he was considering potential military action against Iran, amid mounting mass anti-government protests in the country.

“They’re starting to, it looks like,” Trump said, when asked by reporters aboard Air Force One if Iran had crossed his previously stated red line of protesters being killed.

“We’re looking at it very seriously. The military is looking at it, and we’re looking at some very strong options. We’ll make a determination,” he said.

He also said that Iran’s leadership had called seeking “to negotiate” after his threats of military action.

“The leaders of Iran called” yesterday, Trump said, adding that “a meeting is being set up… They want to negotiate.”

However, Trump added that “we may have to act before a meeting.”

Meanwhile, China said on Monday it hopes the Iranian government and people would be able to overcome the current difficulties the country faces and maintain stability, referring to deadly protests taking place in the oil-rich Middle Eastern nation.

China opposes the use of force or the threat of it in international relations matters, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson said when responding to a media question about US President Donald Trump’s threat to intervene with military on behalf of the protesters.

“We have always opposed interference in other countries’ internal affairs and consistently advocated that the sovereignty and security of all nations should be fully protected by international law,” spokesperson Mao Ning said at a regular news briefing.

Trump to meet senior advisers

Trump was to meet with senior advisers on Tuesday to discuss options for Iran, a US official told Reuters on Sunday.

The Wall Street Journal had reported that options included military strikes, using secret cyber weapons, widening sanctions and providing online help to anti-government sources.

Earlier, Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf warned Washington against “a miscalculation.”

“Let us be clear: in the case of an attack on Iran, the occupied territories (Israel) as well as all US bases and ships will be our legitimate target,” said Qalibaf, a former commander in Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards.

Iranian president calls for ‘national resistance march’

The Iranian government declared three days of national mourning for “martyrs” including members of the security forces killed in two weeks of protests, state television reported on Sunday.

The government described the fight against what it has termed “riots” as an “Iranian national resistance battle against America and the Zionist regime”, using the clerical leadership’s term for Israel, which the Islamic Republic does not recognise.

President Masoud Pezeshkian urged people to take part in a “national resistance march” of nationwide rallies on Monday to denounce the violence, which the government said was committed by “urban terrorist criminals”, state television reported.

Protests have swelled in recent days despite an internet blackout that has lasted more than 72 hours, according to monitor Netblocks. Activists have warned that the shutdown is limiting the flow of information and that the actual toll risks being far higher.

Meanwhile, unrest in Iran has killed more than 500 people, a rights group said on Sunday.

According to its latest figures, from activists inside and outside Iran, the US-based rights group HRANA said it had verified the deaths of 490 protesters and 48 security personnel, with more than 10,600 people arrested in two weeks of unrest.

• Home Dept confirms change made in unusual out-of-cycle review.
• Four countries shifted from Evidence Level 2 to Evidence Level 3.
• These four countries accounted for third of int’l enrolments last year.

Australia has tightened scrutiny of student visa applications from three countries, including India, Nepal, Bangladesh and Bhutan, after moving the four South Asian countries into its highest risk category, citing what it described as “emerging integrity issues”, Australian media reported.

The Home Affairs Department confirmed that on January 8, 2026, the Evidence Levels of several South Asian nations were changed in an unusual out-of-cycle review. The four countries were shifted from Evidence Level 2 to Evidence Level 3, a move that places them in the highest risk group under Australia’s Simplified Student Visa Framework.

Together, India, Nepal, Bangladesh and Bhutan accounted for nearly one-third of all international student enrolments last year. A Home Affairs spokesperson said the changes were aimed at better managing integrity risks while continuing to support genuine students.

“This change will assist with the effective management of emerging integrity issues, while continuing to facilitate genuine students seeking a quality education in Australia,” the spokesperson said. He added that the government wanted international students to have confidence that they were investing in a high-quality education system.

Former Immigration Department deputy secretary Dr Abul Rizvi described the move as “highly unusual”, noting that Evidence Levels are normally updated only once a year. Under the framework, countries are assessed based on factors such as fraud-related refusals, visa cancellations, unlawful overstays and subsequent refugee applications.

An Evidence Level 3 rating means both applicants and education providers must provide more detailed documentation on financial capacity and academic history. Dr Rizvi said this would lead to greater manual checks, including verification of transcripts and financial statements, and would slow processing times.

The change follows a visit to India last month by country’s Assistant Minister for International Education Julian Hill, who met Home Affairs officials on the ground. 

Dr Rizvi said authorities may have run special data checks after identifying a rise in concerning cases.

While the government has not changed its national planning level of 295,000 student places for 2026, Dr Rizvi said higher refusal rates from the affected countries would require more students to be sourced from elsewhere.

• Rohingya genocide first case ICJ will hear in full in over decade. 
• Myanmar denies accusations of genocide against minority Muslims.
• Muslim West African country of Gambia filed case at ICJ.

A landmark case accusing Myanmar of committing genocide against minority Muslim Rohingya will open at the United Nations’ top court on Monday.

It will be the first genocide case the International Court of Justice (ICJ) will hear in full in over a decade. The outcome will have repercussions beyond Myanmar, likely affecting South Africa’s genocide case at the ICJ against Israel over the war in Gaza.

Myanmar has denied accusations of genocide.

“The case is likely to set critical precedents for how genocide is defined and how it can be proven, and how violations can be remedied,” Nicholas Koumjian, head of the UN’s Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar, told Reuters.

The predominantly Muslim West African country of Gambia filed the case at the ICJ — also known as the World Court — in 2019, accusing Myanmar of committing genocide against the Rohingya, a mainly Muslim minority in the remote western Rakhine state.

Myanmar’s armed forces launched an offensive in 2017 that forced at least 730,000 Rohingya from their homes and into neighbouring Bangladesh, where they recounted killings, mass rape and arson.

A UN fact-finding mission concluded the 2017 military offensive had included “genocidal acts”.

Myanmar authorities rejected that report, saying its military offensive was a legitimate counter-terrorism campaign in response to attacks by Muslim “militants”.

In 2019 preliminary hearings in the ICJ case, Myanmar’s then leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, rejected Gambia’s accusations of genocide as “incomplete and misleading”.

The hearings at the ICJ will mark the first time that Rohingya victims of the alleged atrocities will be heard by an international court although those sessions will be closed to the public and the media for sensitivity and privacy reasons.

The hearings start at 10am (0900 GMT) on Monday and will span three weeks.

Myanmar has been in further turmoil since 2021, when the military toppled the elected civilian government and violently suppressed pro-democracy protests, sparking a nationwide armed rebellion.

The country is currently holding phased elections that have been criticised by the United Nations, some Western countries and human rights groups as not free or fair.