LIVE: Iran kills two in missile strike on Abu Dhabi as oil prices rise

Defence Secretary John Healey has stressed that the Government does not believe Iran has any plans to attack the UK, but declined to rule out that the country has the capability to do so.

Asked repeatedly on Sky News whether Iran could reach London with missile strikes, he said: ‘We have no assessment of Iranian plans to strike London.’

Pressed further on whether the country has the capability to strike London, he said: ‘What I’m saying, and trying to reassure people is, that we’ve got no assessment that Iran has any plans to attack.

‘But we have the resources, we have the alliance in place to be able to defend Britain, and we do that with allies, and we do that with Nato.

‘As far as Iran goes, they’re demonstrating a capacity to hit across the Middle East, we see the same tactics and technologies that we see employed by Russia in Ukraine, and this is the hidden hand of Putin in both conflicts.

‘I’m releasing today our latest defence intelligence assessment, which says that Russia was almost certainly providing training, sharing intelligence with Iran ahead of this conflict, including on types of drones, including on electronic warfare, and whilst Putin may want us to be distracted by the Middle East, we’re determined that we won’t be.’

The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Navy Commander Alireza Tangsiri has reportedly been killed in a strike by the IDF on Iran.

Locals news outlets in Israel said the top Iranian military official, who was responsible for closing the Strait of Hormuz, is dead.

The UK’s Defence Secretary John Healey told the BBC this morning that there was an ‘axis of aggression’ between Russia and Iran.

He said that the latest defence intelligence shows that, prior to the conflict in the Middle East, Russia was sharing intelligence and providing training to Iran and that the ‘hidden hand of Putin’ is in Iran.

He said Russia has been providing training to Iran on types of drones and electronic warfare, saying: ‘Putin wants us to be distracted from what he is doing elsewhere. We won’t let him.’

Mr Healey added that British pilots have racked up over 1,000 hours protecting allies and British interests in the region.

The Israeli military said one of its soldiers has been killed during its ongoing operation in southern Lebanon, AlJazeera reported.

In a statement on Telegram, the army said 21-year-old Ori Greenberg, a soldier from the Golani Brigade, was killed.

Two people have been killed in Abu Dhabi after being struck by debris from a downed Iranian missile, as Iran continues its attacks on the Gulf states.

Three people were also wounded by the fallout, after air defences intercepted the ballistic missile on the outskirts of Abu Dhabi, the government’s press office announced today.

The Abu Dhabi Media Office said in a post on X: ‘The incident resulted in the deaths of two unidentified individuals, three injuries, and damage to a number of cars.’

The missile reportedly slammed down on Sweihan Road, hitting vehicles and passengers in a strike overnight.

The UAE’s ministry of defence said air defences in the country continue to respond to ongoing missile and drone threats from Iran.

Reform UK has called for VAT on petrol to be slashed amid price rises since the Iran war.

Robert Jenrick said he will call on Chancellor Rachel Reeves to halve VAT on petrol for three months following the increasing oil prices caused by the conflict in the Middle East.

Reform UK said the move would reduce pump prices by 12p a litre for petrol and 14p a litre for diesel, at a cost to the taxpayer of £1.5 billion.

Since the outbreak of the Iran war, prices have increased by around 15p a litre for petrol and 30p a litre for diesel.

Mr Jenrick, Reform’s economic spokesman, is expected to make the call on a visit to a petrol station in Dover, where he will offer drivers 5p off fuel.

The visit follows a similar stunt by party leader Nigel Farage earlier this month as part of Reform’s campaign against the Government’s plan to reverse the temporary 5p cut to fuel duty introduced after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Mr Jenrick said: ‘The Chancellor is raking it in while motorists suffer.

‘The rising costs of fuel are really hitting alarm-clock Britain right now.

‘She’s making tens of millions of pounds a week in extra tax revenue as a direct result of the war; the least she could do is lessen the blow.’

Putin is reportedly sending Russian-made lethal weapons to Iran, according to reports citing western intelligence sources.

Top Iranian and Russian officials began discussing the delivery of drones in early March – just days after the US and Israel launched strikes on Iran, two officials briefed on the intelligence told the Financial Times.

A staggered shipment of drones, as well as food and medicine, is expected to be completed by the end of the month.

It includes Russian-made Shahed-type drones, and follows Tehran’s supply of its lethal Shaheds to Moscow in 2022 for use in the war on Ukraine.

In response, Moscow said it was ‘continuing its dialogue’ with the Iranian leadership.

Asked whether Russia was sending drones to Iran, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: ‘There are a lot of fakes going around right now. One thing is true – we are continuing our dialogue with the Iranian leadership.’

A senior Western official told the FT that Moscow is ramping up efforts to help Iran’s military capabilities and support the broader stability of Tehran’s regime.

Putin is also reportedly providing Iran with satellite imagery, targeting data, and other intelligence support.

The exact models of drones being sent by Russia to Iran remain unclear, but it is likely that Moscow will send drones similar to the Geran-2, which is based on Iran’s own Shahed-136 design.

Iran sent Shahed drones to Russia in 2022, shortly after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Since 2023, Russia has been developing its own versions of these drones, based on the Iranian designs but modified to evade air defences and carry bigger payloads.

Russia has admitted sending ‘humanitarian aid’ to Iran publicly, but not spoken openly about sending weapons.

Evidence so far of Russia’s involvement in the Iranian conflict includes Russian military technology being reportedly found inside the Iranian drone that struck the British air base in Cyprus.

Israel also reportedly struck a key supply route between Russia and Iran on the Caspian Sea last week in a big to disrupt the pipeline.

Iran is running a ‘de facto “toll booth” regime’ in the Strait of Hormuz, controlling which ships come through and getting payment for their safe passage, a leading shipping intelligence firm said Thursday.

Lloyd’s List Intelligence published an analysis highlighting Iran’s practices through the strait.

It described vessels having to provide manifests, crew details and their destination to Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard.

The information goes to the Guard’s ‘Hormozgan Provincial Command for sanctions screening, cargo alignment checks that currently prioritizes oil over all other commodities, and for what is described as “geopolitical vetting,”‘ Lloyd’s List said.

‘While not all ships are paying a direct toll at least two vessels have and the payment is settled in yuan,’ Lloyd’s List said, referring to China’s national currency.

Such payments likely would run afoul of American and European sanctions on the Guard, a key power center within Iran that controls its ballistic missile arsenal and was key in suppressing nationwide protests in January.

Iran has not directly explained the process for ships to go through the strait, though a Foreign Ministry spokesperson appeared to acknowledge Tehran was receiving payments for some ships in an interview.

Activists in Iran reported heavy strikes early Thursday morning around Isfahan, a city some 330 kilometers (205 miles) south of Iran’s capital, Tehran.

The pro-reform newspaper Ham Mihan reported online about strikes in the area.

Isfahan is home to a major Iranian air base and other military sites, as well as one of the nuclear sites bombed by the United States during the 12-day war between Israel and Iran in June.

The semiofficial Fars news agency, close to the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, described the attacks as targeting ‘two residential areas,’ without elaborating.

Earlier, Israel’s military said it had completed ‘a wide-scale wave of strikes’ across Iran, including in Isfahan.

The United Arab Emirates said a few moments ago that it was intercepting Iranian missile and drone attacks over its territory.

It said its air defence systems were being deployed to intercept ballistic missiles, while fighter jets are in the sky to down incoming drones.

This is the third such warning the defence ministry has issued since Wednesday night.

Oil prices are up again this morning as the war in the Middle East continues to rage on.

Brent crude, the global standard, is up by 1.61 per cent to $103.87 a barrel.

It had dropped below triple digits on Wednesday after President Trump had talked up the possibility of a peace deal with Iran – but Tehran’s denial that any talks are taking place appears to have brought it back up again.

The UK government is to reopen a carbon dioxide plant with a Government grant of up to £100million amid fears of shortages caused by the war in Iran.

Business Secretary Peter Kyle signed off the grant to reopen the Ensus plant on Teesside, in the North East of England, according to the Financial Times.

It is understood the grant will pay to get the plant up and running again for an initial three-month period.

The plant was mothballed last year after a trade deal with the US cut tariffs on bioethanol, its main product.

It will be reopened due to its ability to produce CO2 as a by-product. The gas is vital for several sectors, including drinks and the nuclear industry, but supply has been disrupted thanks to soaring energy costs on other sources such as fertiliser factories.

The grant for the Ensus plant is the first major intervention by the UK Government aimed at tackling possible shortages caused by the Iran conflict.

But fears range much wider than CO2, with former BP executive Nick Butler telling Times Radio the UK could face oil and gas shortages in two to three weeks.

He said: ‘There will be shortages and I think the Government now should be seriously planning how they’re going to handle that and part of that is maximising supply.’

On Tuesday, Shell chief executive Wael Sawan issued a similar warning at an industry conference.

Ministers continue to insist the supply of petrol remains reliable.

Energy minister Michael Shanks told MPs on Wednesday the Government was ‘absolutely not’ planning for blackouts or petrol rationing, insisting the UK had a ‘strong and diverse range of supplies’.

The key question remains how long Iran’s effective blockade of the vital Strait of Hormuz will last.

On Thursday, Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper will urge Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz as she travels to the G7 Foreign Ministers’ meeting in France.

She will make clear that the UK will help ensure safe passage for ships through the strait and provide an additional £2million in humanitarian aid to Lebanon.

Ms Cooper is expected to hold talks with counterparts, including US secretary of state Marco Rubio, France’s Jean-Noel Barrot, and Germany’s Johann Wadephul.

The strait remained closed on Wednesday evening, despite Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi claiming it was open to ‘non-hostile’ shipping.

The conflict continued with Washington saying it would hit Iran ‘harder’ if Tehran refused to accept it had been ‘defeated militarily’.

White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt insisted ‘productive’ talks were continuing between Washington and Tehran.

But Mr Araghchi said in a message on his Telegram channel, translated from Farsi, that there had been ‘no negotiations or discussions with the American side’ and suggested the US had effectively admitted defeat.

He said: ‘Didn’t they talk about “unconditional surrender” before? What happened now that they are talking about negotiations and calling for them?

‘I will explain that there are no negotiations, but the fact that they are mobilising their highest officials to negotiate with the Islamic Republic indicates their acceptance of defeat.’