WASHINGTON — 

The United States is removing nearly two dozen Saudi military students from a training program and sending them back to Saudi Arabia following an investigation into a deadly shooting by a Saudi aviation student at a Florida Navy base last month, Atty. Gen. William Barr said Monday.

Many of the 21 cadets had contact with child pornography and possessed jihadist or anti-American material, Barr said. None is accused of having advance knowledge of the shooting, which Barr said was motivated by “jihadist ideology” and has been classified as an act of terrorism.

The 21-year-old Saudi air force officer, 2nd Lt. Mohammed Alshamrani, opened fire at the base in Pensacola, killing three U.S. sailors and injuring eight other people. The Justice Department has been investigating the shooting as an act of terrorism.

Officials have said Alshamrani hosted a party before the shooting where he and others watched videos of mass shootings. The gunman had also apparently taken to Twitter before the shooting to criticize U.S. support of Israel and accuse America of being anti-Muslim, another U.S. official told the Associated Press last month.

Alshamrani, who was killed by a sheriff’s deputy during the rampage at a classroom building, was undergoing flight training at Pensacola, where foreign military members routinely receive instruction.

It was not immediately clear on what grounds the students were being removed from the program, though the official said they were not suspected of having played any role in the attack. The precise number of students being removed was also not clear. The officials discussing the case spoke on condition of anonymity to speak about details involved in an ongoing investigation.

The plan to remove the students was first reported by CNN.

The December shooting raised questions about how well international military students are screened before they attend training at American bases. Some lawmakers, including a top Republican ally of President Trump, have called for Saudi Arabia to be suspended from an American military training program.

Trump called for the program to be reviewed. But Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said the program needed to be reevaluated after the attack.

A Saudi commanding officer had ordered all students from the country to remain at one location at the base after the attack.

National security advisor Robert O’Brien said in an interview on Fox News that the shooting “showed that there had been errors in the way that we vetted” the students. The actions being taken by the Justice Department and Defense Department to remove the Saudi students are to “protect our service men and women,” he said.

Federal officials are still investigating the shooting and examining evidence. Earlier this week, the FBI asked Apple to help extract data from two iPhones that belonged to the gunman.

Investigators have been trying to access the two devices — an iPhone 7 and an iPhone 5 — but have been unable to because the phones are locked and encrypted, according to a letter from the FBI’s general counsel, Dana Boente. The FBI has received a court authorization to search the phones and the devices have been sent to the bureau’s lab in Quantico, Va., he said.

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The investigation is considered a “high-priority national security matter,” Boente said in the letter.

FBI officials have sought help from other federal agencies and experts, and investigators have been trying to guess the passwords, but those efforts have been unsuccessful, according to the letter.

Apple said in a statement that it has already provided investigators with all the relevant data held by the company and would continue to support the investigators.

At least one of the phones was struck by a sheriff’s deputy’s bullet during the attack but investigators believe they may still be able to extract data from the device, according to a person familiar with the matter. The person spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation.

TEHRAN — 

Iran said Tuesday that authorities have made arrests for the accidental shooting down of a Ukrainian passenger plane, which killed all 176 people on board and set off protests in the country demanding accountability after officials initially concealed the cause of the crash.

Iran’s Judiciary spokesman Gholamhossein Esmaili said “some individuals” were arrested after “extensive investigations.” His statement on the judiciary’s website did not say how many people had been detained or name those arrested.

Iran at first dismissed allegations that a missile had brought down the plane, but in the face of mounting evidence officials acknowledged on Saturday — three days later — that its Revolutionary Guard had shot down the plane by mistake as the force braced for a possible military confrontation with the United States.

The plane, en route from Tehran to the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, was carrying 167 passengers and nine crew members from several countries, including 82 Iranians and 57 Canadians, many of whom were Iranians with dual citizenship. There were several children among the passengers, including an infant.

Iran’s president on Tuesday called for a special court with “a ranking judge and dozens of experts” to be set up to probe the incident.

“The responsibility falls on more than just one person,” President Hassan Rouhani said in a televised speech, adding that those found culpable “should be punished.”

“There are others, too, and I want that this issue is expressed honestly,” he said, without elaborating.

Rouhani called the incident “a painful and unforgivable” mistake and promised that his administration would pursue the case “by all means.”

“This is not an ordinary case. The entire the world will be watching this court,” he said.

Tensions have been escalating since President Trump pulled the U.S. out of Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, then reimposed sanctions that had been lifted under the accord.

The deal has quickly unraveled since then, with Iran steadily breaking away from limits on its nuclear program and Europe unable to find ways to keep Tehran committed.

The U.S. sanctions have devastated Iran’s economy.

On Tuesday, Britain, France and Germany triggered the so-called “dispute mechanism” action that paves the way for possible further sanctions in response to Iran’s moves.

Tensions sharply escalated further when a U.S. airstrike Jan. 3 killed Iran’s most powerful commander, Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Suleimani, in Baghdad.

In response, Iran launched ballistic missiles on military bases housing U.S. troops in Iraq to avenge Suleimani’s killing. The Ukrainian plane was shot down in Tehran as Iranian forces were on alert for possible U.S. retaliation.

While Rouhani pointed to mistakes and negligence, he also repeated the government’s line that the plane disaster was ultimately rooted in U.S. aggression.

“It was the U.S. that made for an agitated environment. It was the U.S. that created an unusual situation. It was the U.S. that threatened and took our beloved [Suleimani],” he said.

Rouhani called the government’s admission that Iranian forces shot down the plane a “first good step.”

He added that Iranian experts who retrieved the Ukrainian plane’s flight recorder, the so-called black box, have sent it to France for analysis.

Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, the head of the Guard’s aerospace division, said over the weekend his unit accepts full responsibility. He said when he learned about the downing of the plane, “I wished I was dead.”

The incident raised questions about why Iran did not shut down its international airport or airspace the day it was on alert for U.S. military retaliation.

The shootdown and the lack of transparency around it have reignited anger in Iran at the country’s leadership. Online videos appeared to show security forces firing live ammunition and tear gas to disperse protests in the streets.

Also Tuesday, Iran’s judiciary said that 30 people had been detained in the protests, and that some were released, without elaborating further. An Iranian film director who’d called for protests in Tehran’s Azadi, or Freedom, Square is among those released.

Iranian authorities briefly arrested British Ambassador Rob Macaire on Saturday evening. He said he went to a candlelight vigil to pay his respects for the victims of the Ukrainian plane disaster and left as soon as the chanting began and it turned into a protest.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry summoned the British ambassador on Sunday to protest what it said was his presence at an illegal protest. Britain, in turn, summoned Iran’s ambassador on Monday “to convey our strong objections” over the weekend arrest.

Iran’s top prosecutor, Mohammad Javad Montazeri, was quoted in local media Tuesday as saying the British ambassador must be expelled from the country as soon as possible.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — 

The demonstrations that erupted after Iran admitted to accidentally shooting down a passenger plane during a tense standoff with the United States last week are the latest of several waves of protest going back to the 1979 Islamic Revolution — all of which have been violently suppressed.

Iranians were shocked and appalled by the shoot-down of the Ukrainian jetliner which killed all 176 people on board, mostly Iranians. Many are also angry at the government’s misleading statements in the wake of the tragedy, which it initially blamed on a technical problem.

Iranians are also suffering from an economic crisis exacerbated by severe sanctions imposed by President Trump after he withdrew the U.S. from Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.

Trump has encouraged the protests — even as he has long embraced other autocrats who smother dissent. His administration hopes that the demonstrations, along with crippling U.S. sanctions, will bring about fundamental change in a longtime adversary.

But large numbers of Iranians still support the clerically led government, as seen by the massive turnout for the funeral of Gen. Qassem Suleimani, Iran’s top general, who was killed in a U.S. airstrike in Baghdad. Even many critics of the government saw him as a war hero who had helped defeat Islamic State and resisted Western hegemony in the Middle East.

Iran’s security forces have shown in the past that they will use deadly force against anyone threatening the Islamic Republic, most recently in November, when rights groups say hundreds of people were killed in demonstrations sparked by a hike in gasoline prices.

Here is a look at past protests in Iran, and how its theocracy prevailed.

The Islamic Revolution

The 1979 Islamic Revolution began with broad-based mass protests that eventually forced the Western-backed monarchy from power. But in the resulting chaos, hard-line followers of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini quickly moved to sideline left-wing and moderate opposition groups, forcing many Iranians into prison or exile and establishing a firm foundation for clerical rule. Iran also suppressed a rebellion from among its Kurdish minority in a yearslong military campaign. In 1988, at the close of the disastrous Iran-Iraq war, Iran is believed to have executed thousands of political prisoners, something authorities have yet to publicly acknowledge.

A student uprising

The closure of a reformist newspaper in 1999 ignited a week of student protests. On July 9, security forces and hard-line vigilantes stormed a student dormitory at Tehran University. At least three people were killed and 1,200 were arrested in the unrest, which spread to other cities. The protests unfolded amid a power struggle between President Mohammad Khatami, a popular reformist, and hard-liners who dominate the Revolutionary Guard and the security apparatus. The hard-liners eventually prevailed, and the resulting crackdown set back reform efforts for a decade.

The green movement

The largest and most sustained protests since the Islamic Revolution erupted in the summer of 2009, after the reformist opposition disputed the reelection of hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Millions of Iranians took part in months of protests in several major cities. Green movement leaders did not call for the overthrow of the system, but for the reversal of the allegedly rigged election, greater social freedoms and the reining in of the security forces.

Authorities nevertheless responded with a massive crackdown. The Revolutionary Guard and its volunteer force, the Basij militia, opened fire on protesters and launched a wave of arrests. Opposition leaders were placed under house arrest and silenced in the largely state-run media.

President Obama came under criticism for not offering a full-throated endorsement of the protests. But it’s unclear if that would have made a difference, and it might have fed into hard-liners’ allegations that the protests were part of a Western plot.

Economic protests

Since withdrawing from the 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and world powers, Trump has imposed “maximum” sanctions on Iran that he says are aimed at countering its nuclear program and its support for armed groups across the region. The sanctions, including those targeting the vital oil industry, have eviscerated Iran’s economy, wiping away many people’s life savings and fueling high unemployment.

In the 18 months since the U.S. began restoring sanctions, Iran has seen waves of sporadic, leaderless protests initially focused on economic grievances and perceived corruption among the clerical elite and the Revolutionary Guard. Each time, the protests rapidly escalated into chants against Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and calls for the end of clerical rule.

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The protests have often turned violent and security forces have responded with deadly force. In the most recent and deadly wave of protests, in November, authorities shut down access to the internet for several days, making it difficult to discern the scale of the protests and the resulting crackdown.

Amnesty International estimates that more than 300 people were killed.

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Charles Leclerc admits that his recent leap of faith from 13,000 feet led to a reprimand from Ferrari as he had not asked his employer permission for the stunt.

With the F1 season done and dusted over a month ago in Abu Dhabi, Leclerc sought to sustain his adrenalin level, indulging in some high-altitude thrill by skydiving for the very first time.

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The Monegasque undertook his initiation in Dubai and jumped in tandem with an instructor, an experience that elated the two-time Grand Prix winner but failed to impress his employer, whose permission he had “forgotten” to seek.

“You normally should do, [and] I do,” explained Leclerc last weekend at the Autosport International Show during a Q&A with fans.

“I didn’t for skydiving, because I just told myself that in case it will go wrong I will not be here to be told off!”

“So, yeah, I just went for it, and then they were a little bit upset. At the end, I won’t do it a second time.

“It was amazing. But it was just to do it once.”

 

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