TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) — Honduras Attorney General Johel Zelaya said Monday that he had ordered Honduran authorities and asked Interpol to execute a 2023 arrest order for ex-President Juan Orlando Hernández, pardoned by U.S. President Donald Trump.
Hernández was released from federal prison in the United States last week after Trump pardoned him. Hernández had been sentenced in U.S. federal court last year to 45 years in prison for helping move tons of cocaine to the United States.
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A screen shows former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, who published a message on TikTok thanking U.S. President Donald Trump for pardoning him, at a coffee shop in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Friday, Dec. 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo)
Soldiers stand guard by farmers protesting President Donald Trump's pardon of Honduras' former President Juan Orlando Hernandez in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo)
Farmers protest against President Donald Trump's pardon of Honduras' former President Juan Orlando Hernandez in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo)
FILE - Honduras' President Juan Orlando Hernandez speaks during the opening ceremony of the UN Climate Change Conference COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland, Monday Nov. 1, 2021. Andy Buchanan/Pool via AP, File)
FILE - Former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, second from right, is taken in handcuffs to a waiting aircraft as he is extradited to the United States, at an Air Force base in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, April 21, 2022. (AP Photo/Elmer Martinez, File)
Hernández went from supposed U.S. ally in the war on drugs to the subject of a U.S. extradition request shortly after he left office in 2022. He was detained and sent to the U.S. by current President Xiomara Castro of the social democrat LIBRE party.
Zelaya included a photo of the two-year-old order signed by a Supreme Court magistrate for alleged fraud and money laundering charges. The order says that it must be executed “in the case that the accused is freed by United States authorities.”
Dozens of Honduran officials and politicians were implicated in the so-called Pandora case in which Honduran prosecutors alleged government funds were diverted through a network on nongovernmental organizations to political parties, including Hernández's 2013 presidential campaign.
A lawyer for Hernández, Renato Stabile, said in an email that, “This is obviously a strictly political move on behalf of the defeated Libre party to try to intimidate President Hernandez as they are being kicked out of power in Honduras. It is shameful and a desperate piece of political theatre and these charges are completely baseless.”
Zelaya had said after Trump announced his intention to pardon Hernández that his office would have to take action to end impunity.
Hernández’s wife said after his release that the former president was in an undisclosed location for his safety.
The drama comes while Honduras is still waiting to find out who its next president will be.
Trump endorsed Nasry Asfura, a former Tegucigalpa mayor from Hernández's conservative National Party. Asfura was leading Salvador Nasralla, also a conservative from the Liberal Party, by barely a percentage point as the vote count slowly advanced.
An Asfura victory could potentially smooth the way for Hernández's eventual return to Honduras. Nasralla has made fighting corruption the centerpiece of his campaign and has said Hernández stole the 2017 election from him in a vote that was full of irregularities.
Hernández always denied any wrongdoing while in office and insisted he was among the strongest antidrug allies of the United States.
Trump had announced his intention to pardon Hernández just days before Honduras' national elections, throwing a new element into a close contest. While some Hondurans remain nostalgic for Hernández's two terms in office, many were shocked that a man convicted of drug trafficking in a closely watched trial could suddenly be released early in his sentence.
Trump said Hondurans had requested the pardon for Hernández and that after looking at his case he decided Hernández had been unfairly treated by prosecutors.
A screen shows former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, who published a message on TikTok thanking U.S. President Donald Trump for pardoning him, at a coffee shop in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Friday, Dec. 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo)
Soldiers stand guard by farmers protesting President Donald Trump's pardon of Honduras' former President Juan Orlando Hernandez in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo)
Farmers protest against President Donald Trump's pardon of Honduras' former President Juan Orlando Hernandez in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo)
FILE - Honduras' President Juan Orlando Hernandez speaks during the opening ceremony of the UN Climate Change Conference COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland, Monday Nov. 1, 2021. Andy Buchanan/Pool via AP, File)
FILE - Former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, second from right, is taken in handcuffs to a waiting aircraft as he is extradited to the United States, at an Air Force base in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, April 21, 2022. (AP Photo/Elmer Martinez, File)
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran expanded its targets Tuesday, striking the U.S. Embassy in Saudi Arabia as Washington began to pull many staff out of the Middle East. The U.S. and Israel battered Iran with airstrikes in what President Donald Trump suggested was just the start of a war that has severely disrupted the world’s supply of oil and gas, international shipping, and air travel.
The conflict escalated further on its fourth day, with Israel sending new ground troops into Lebanon and explosions ringing out in Iran’s capital. Hundreds of people have been killed, the vast majority in Iran.
The spiraling nature of the war raised questions about when and how it would end. Trump said it could last four to five weeks — but that the U.S. was prepared to go longer. He seemed to leave open the possibility for more extensive U.S. military involvement, telling the New York Post on Monday that he was not ruling out the possibility of boots on the ground.
Still, the administration's objectives remain unclear. The initial U.S.-Israeli strikes killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Trump urged Iranians to overthrow their government.
Since then, however, senior administration officials have said regime change was not the goal. Trump’s initial announcement of the strikes listed several grievances, from concerns about Iran’s nuclear and missile programs to its leadership.
An attack from two drones on the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh caused a “limited fire,” according to Saudi Arabia’s Defense Ministry, and the embassy urged Americans to avoid the compound. It followed an attack on the U.S. Embassy in Kuwait that announced Tuesday it had been closed until further notice.
The U.S. State Department ordered the evacuation of non-emergency personnel and family in Kuwait, Bahrain, Iraq, Qatar, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. In addition, the U.S. has urged citizens to leave more than a dozen Middle Eastern countries, as have many other countries, though with much of the airspace closed many remained stranded.
The U.S.-Israeli strikes have killed at least 787 people, according to the Iranian Red Crescent Society. In Israel, where Iranian missiles struck several locations, 11 people were killed. The Iranian-supported militant group Hezbollah has also attacked Israel, whose retaliatory strikes killed 52 people in Lebanon.
The U.S. military has confirmed six deaths of American service members. Three people were killed in the United Arab Emirates, and one each in Kuwait and Bahrain.
Across Iran’s capital, explosions rang out throughout the night into Tuesday, with aircraft heard overhead. Strikes caused two explosions at a broadcasting facility in Tehran, Iranian state TV said, adding that no one was injured.
The United Nations’ nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, said Iran’s Natanz nuclear enrichment site had sustained “some recent damage,” though there was “no radiological consequence expected.”
The U.S. hit Natanz during the 12-day war in June, when Israeli and American strikes greatly weakened Iran's nuclear program.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu maintained, however, that Iran was rebuilding “new sites, new places” underground for making atomic bombs. He offered no evidence to support his claim.
“We had to take the action now and we did,” Netanyahu told Fox News Channel’s Hannity.
Iran has said it has not enriched uranium since June, though it has maintained its right to and says its nuclear program is peaceful.
Satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press showed limited activity at two Iranian nuclear sites before the war. Analysts said Tehran was likely assessing damage from the 2025 strikes and possibly salvaging what remained.
The expansion of Iranian retaliation across the Gulf and the intensity of the Israeli and American attacks, Khamenei's killing and the lack of any apparent exit plan suggested the conflict could be prolonged.
Trump said Monday that operations are likely to last four to five weeks but that he was prepared “to go far longer than that.” He later added the U.S. had a “virtually unlimited supply” of munitions.
“Wars can be fought ‘forever,’ and very successfully, using just these supplies,” he wrote on social media.
Iran has hit many countries deemed safe havens in the Mideast in retaliation for the U.S.-Israeli strikes. Recent targets included two Amazon data centers in the United Arab Emirates and one in Bahrain. The centers in the UAE were hit, while a drone struck near the one Bahrain, causing damage, the company said.
Iran has also struck energy facilities in Qatar and Saudi Arabia, and attacked several ships Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which a fifth of all oil traded passes, sending global oil and natural gas prices soaring.
“The Strait of Hormuz is closed,” declared Iranian Brig. Gen. Ebrahim Jabbari, an adviser to the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, vowing that any ships that passed through it would be set on fire.
Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesman Majed Al Ansari vowed that Iranian attacks on the gas-rich country “will not go unanswered.”
The conflict has spread to Lebanon, where Hezbollah fired missiles at Israel on Monday, prompting Israel to retaliate.
On Tuesday, the Israeli military said it had moved additional troops into southern Lebanon and taken new positions on several strategic points close to the border.
Israel also hit Beirut with more airstrikes, saying it was targeting “Hezbollah command centers and weapons storage facilities.” Explosions could be heard and smoke seen in a southern suburb of Beirut.
Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said the Lebanese army was evacuating some of its border positions. A senior Hezbollah official, Mohamoud Komati, said the group now had no option but to fight Israel.
This story has been updated to clarify that more than one drone hit the U.S. Embassy in Saudi Arabia. Some instances referred to just one drone.
Becatoros reported from Athens, Greece, and Magdy from Cairo. Konstantin Toropin in Washington, David Rising in Bangkok, Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv, Israel, Hallie Golden in Seattle, and Giovanna Dell'Orto in Miami contributed to this report.
A firefighter extinguishes fire at a building that was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, a southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, March 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A woman crosses almost deserted square with a billboard at rear showing a portrait of the late Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in the U.S.–Israeli military campaign, in Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, March 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
Smoke rises from a destroyed building that was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, a southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, March 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
An Iranian flag is placed among the ruins of a police station struck Monday during the U.S.–Israeli military campaign in Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, March 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
Smoke rises from Israeli airstrikes in Dahiyeh, a southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, March 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Jewish men covered in prayer shawls pray in an underground parking garage as a precaution against possible Iranian missile attacks, in Tel Aviv, Israel, Tuesday, March 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty)
A group of men inspects the ruins of a police station struck Monday amid the U.S.–Israeli military campaign in Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, March 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
Smoke rises from Israeli airstrikes in Dahiyeh, a southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, March 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Smoke rises from Israeli airstrikes in Dahiyeh, a southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, early Tuesday, March 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
This image provided by U.S. Central Command shows a F-35C Lightning II preparing for launch on the flight deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72) in support of Operation Epic Fury on Monday, March 2, 2026. (U.S. Navy via AP)
Mourners take cover while air-raid sirens warn of incoming missiles launched by Iran toward Israel during the funeral of Sarah Elimelech and her daughter Ronit who were killed in an Iranian missile attack, in Beit Shemesh, Israel, Monday, March 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
A worker instals a billboard on an overpass containing a portrait of the late Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed during the ongoing joint U.S.-Israeli military campaign, in Tehran, Iran, Monday, March 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
Smoke engulfs a street after a strike in Tehran, Iran, Monday, March 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Mohsen Ganji)
