Iran has lashed out at German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier for downplaying the unlawful attacks by the United States and the Israeli regime against the Islamic Republic as merely an “unnecessary war”, saying they were a “blatant” act of aggression against a sovereign state.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei made the comment in a post on his X account on Friday after the German president on Thursday described the illegal joint military aggression by the US and Israel on Iran as a “truly avoidable, unnecessary war.”

“The American-Israeli attack on Iran cannot be downplayed or reframed as merely an ‘unnecessary war.’ It was a flagrant violation of Article 2(4) of the UN Charter — a blatant act of aggression against a sovereign State,” Baghaei said.

He added that the US-Israel imposed war on Iran “could and should have been avoided”.

“The UN Charter does not recognize any notion of a ‘necessary war’ that would grant States the right to use force against another sovereign nation based on the arbitrary & whimsical decisions of aggressors,” he emphasized.

He urged any nation that values ​​the rule of law and the UN Charter to “unequivocally” condemn the US-Israel act of aggression and to call for accountability.

The Iranian spokesperson also confirmed the German president’s remarks regarding the current escalation and instability in the West Asian region following the unilateral destruction by the Trump administration of the 2015 nuclear agreement, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

“It is true that the current crisis confronting our region and the world stems directly from the United States’ unlawful and capricious withdrawal from the JCPOA in May 2018,” Baghaei wrote.

Steinmeier directly addressed the JCPOA, stating it would have been better if that agreement had been preserved, and emphasized: “If the 2015 agreement with Iran had been preserved, it would have been possible to prevent the consequences we are currently witnessing.”

Steinmeier, who was personally involved in negotiating the JCPOA as foreign minister, bluntly called the war “a politically disastrous mistake” and a “politically fatal error.”

By openly admitting the US-Israel war against Iran was avoidable and that preserving the JCPOA could have prevented today’s crisis, the German head of state has effectively validated Tehran’s consistent position. Iran says that diplomacy and respect for its sovereign rights, not sanctions and bombs, are the path to regional peace and security.

The German president’s candid intervention is further evidence of the growing international isolation of the aggressors.

The criminal US-Israeli aggression against Iran began on February 28 with airstrikes that assassinated senior Iranian officials and commanders, including Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei.

Iranian Armed Forces responded by launching daily missile and drone operations targeting locations in the Israeli-occupied territories as well as US military bases and assets across the region.

On April 8, forty days into the war, a Pakistan-brokered temporary ceasefire between Iran and the US took effect.

Some parts of India are grappling with power cuts as record-breaking heat has pushed electricity demand to an all-time high in excess of 270 gigawatts, spurring a government call for consumers to limit use.

An El Nino weather pattern is bringing above-average summer temperatures across the subcontinent in May, with nighttime outages running from 40 minutes to an hour in the manufacturing and infotech hub of Chennai, residents said.

“South Chennai has seen frequent power cuts over the past two days, with outages at short intervals,” said R Hari, a resident of the southern city, who complained that they made it difficult to work from home.

India’s peak power deficit late on Thursday evening was about 2.57 gigawatts, said national regulator Grid-India.

“Although we are prepared to supply electricity as required, due to the intense summer, let us all try to use electricity wisely and judiciously,” the power ministry said in a statement on Friday.

Shortages are chronic during the evening hours as supply then relies heavily on thermal and hydropower sources, while daytime demand is met partly by solar generation.

The record heat and surging electricity demand are testing India’s power system, said Disha Aggarwal, senior programme lead at energy and environment think-tank CEEW, as hotter nights become the norm.

India needs to urgently fast-track commissioning of battery storage to make use of surplus solar energy at night, she added.

From Friday to May 27, weather authorities have forecast “heatwave to severe heatwave conditions” for the capital New Delhi, along with large northern and eastern areas.

Several people in New Delhi and the neighbouring city of Noida took to X to complain of power outages during the night.

In the eastern coastal state of Odisha, some users have protested against longer power cuts in some areas during both day and night, residents and media said.

• Over 2,000 mourners honour men killed defending mosque.
• FBI investigates attack as suspected hate crime.
• Mourners call for end to anti-Muslim hatred.
  

SAN DIEGO: More than 2,000 people gathered in a San Diego park on Thursday to mourn a security guard and two other men murdered as they tried to stop this week’s attack on the city’s largest mosque.

Men and women, including police officers in uniform, stood in rows for the funeral prayer, or Janazah, to remember the three men referred to as heroes by mourners for delaying and distracting the attackers, preventing further bloodshed at a time when children were at the mosque’s school.

The bodies of the men, Amin Abdullah, 51, Mansour Kaziha, 78, and Nadir Awad, 57, lay beneath cloths and rugs, underneath a white canopy.

“[Allahu Akbar] God is the ⁠greatest,” the mourners chanted in Arabic, raising their hands at the service in a park wedged between the city’s river and a soccer stadium.

The three men were set to be buried alongside one another later in the day at a nearby cemetery.

“Today is a message to everyone. Our community got hurt but our community is standing strong and firm,” said the centre’s imam, Taha Hassane, adding that people had travelled from the eastern United States and across California for the service.

The FBI is investigating the attack as a suspected hate crime, and the killings have put Muslims across the United States on edge at a time of rising Islamophobia.

Mourner Ruba Abu Jamah, who knew all three men, called for an end to the hatred of Muslims that she believed inspired the attackers. She questioned why the mother of one of the ⁠teenage suspects, who alerted police that her son was suicidal, allegedly allowed him to have access to guns.

“For God’s sake, why are we going backwards? Hate takes us backwards,” said Abu Jamah, after hearses took the men’s bodies for burial. “Moms, don’t have a whole display of weapons if you know your 16-year-old kid is depressed.”

Abdullah was shot dead in a gun battle with the teenage assailants during which he used his radio to call in a lockdown procedure, ⁠police said.

Kaziha, the centre’s handyman and cook, as well as Awad, whose wife is a teacher at the centre and who lived across the street from the mosque, were shot dead by the attackers after they heard gunfire and ran towards the centre.

Abdullah’s actions are credited with delaying the assailants’ entry to ⁠the centre, where 140 students hid in closets and other spaces, police said.

The assailants fled the mosque in their vehicle and were later found dead in the car from self-inflicted gunshots, police said.

Khaled Abdullah, 24, the security guard’s son, said his family has drawn strength from the ⁠way his father died.

“The fact that he was on the front line, trying to defend kids and innocent people, that makes me feel good,” Khaled told Reuters on Wednesday. “Calling him a hero is the least we can do.”