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A group of hackers working against the Iranian government have struck again, this time with a second trove of documents obtained from the highest levels of the authoritarian regime. Credit for the attack was claimed by the group calling itself “Ghiam ta Sarnegoun”, or “Rise to Overthrow”. The attack follows a similar episode in early May, when the group defaced the website of Iran’s foreign ministry with messages in support of Maryam Rajavi, president-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran — a politician-in-exile with backing from many in the west, including in Washington. Among the documents posted in the second attack, which were posted online on 29 May, were directives from the office of Iran’s president, Ebrahim Raisi. In one, addressed to a top security chief by Mr Raisi’s chief of staff, the president raises clear concerns about ongoing protests in the country that began last year in response to the killing of a young woman in police custody over her supposedly improper headcovering. “In these incidents, in addition to the initial intelligence surprise of the September 1st, in particular the events of October 26, as well as the strikes and riots on November 15, 16 and 17 no prediction and prevention [options] were [presented], and the analysis were based only on general and imprecise estimates and calls in the social media,” reads one letter in part. “To correct this process and prevent repetition of these surprises in the future what has been done? As the failure and end point of the enemy's project were not included on 7 and 8 of December reports of analyzes and predictions,” that letter continues, adding later: “Unfortunately, in recent months, the reports have mostly [been] describing the events of the streets and waiting to discover the surprising devices of the enemies.” Other documents were equally unflattering. A second letter to an intelligence minister again signed by Mr Raisi’s chief of staff laid out known issues with Iran’s intelligence community including “incompetent and dependent managers”, “infiltration”, as well as “marginalisation and demoralisation of revolutionary forces”. The Independent has not verified the documents in-house, although experts with the Computer Emergency Response Team in Farsi (CERTFA) have called the documents posted on 29 May from the latest hack legitimate. Altogether, the document presents a revealing look at a beleaguered government that found itself largely unable to effectively stamp out demonstrations that swept across the nation in response to a major societal episode — in this case, the killing of a young woman, Mahsa Amini, by so-called “morality police” in the country. The assessment could bode poorly for the Raisi government should similar protests emerge in the near future. The NCRI agreed in a statement to The Independent, arguing that the documents showed “the fragile state” of Iran’s security apparatus and “the fear and vulnerability of the regime”. At the same time, other passages betray the Iranian regime’s continued confidence in its ability to evade or otherwise bear the cost of US sanctions, which were snapped back into place under the Trump administration and remain under the presidency of Joe Biden. If more than bluster, it’s a spark of good news for Iran’s government given the State Department and White House’s lack of success in reaching an agreement to reignite the 2015 nuclear agreement and the resulting low chance of those sanctions being dropped. Mr Biden was heard telling a voter on a ropeline late last year that his administration views the accord signed under the presidency of Barack Obama (and his own vice presidency) to be dead. “It is dead, but we are not gonna announce it,” he said at the time, quipping: “Long story.” Read More Voters think Trump is a criminal, Biden is too old and DeSantis is a fascist, new poll finds Leaving Afghan heroes out in the cold is beyond callous – it shames us all Nikki Haley's husband begins Africa deployment as she campaigns for 2024 GOP nomination Blinken seeks to warm up frosty US-China relations in high-stakes Beijing trip Attorney General Garland keeps poker face as firestorm erupts after Trump charges US, China remain at odds on numerous issues as Blinken finishes first day of meetings in Beijing

Donald Trump supporters and right-wing media outlets are incorrectly claiming that the federal government is seeking the death penalty as part of its four-count indictment against the former president for allegedly seeking to overturn the 2020 election. After the charges were announced on Tuesday, the claims quickly spread across conservative corners of the Internet. Mr Trump’s Truth Social platform sent users an alert that read “New charges against Trump carry DEATH PENALTY,” while conservative influencer Dinesh D’Souza claimed on X the alleged death sentence “proves how scared they are of Trump!” One MAGA Internet personality wrote on social media, “This is how you start a war.” A spokesperson for the special counsel’s office told The Independent these claims are “not accurate.” “The indictment does not contain the special findings required,” the DoJ official said. The misinterpretation stems from one of the federal statutes that prosecutors are accusing Mr Trump of violating, Section 241 of Title 18 of US Code. As The Independent has reported, the law is part of a landmark set of provisions passed in the brutal aftermath of the Civil War to prosecute those who sought to deprive the civil rights of newly enfranchised Black Americans. The punishment for violating this section, according to the Department of Justice, is a felony and up to 10 years in prison. That penalty can be extended to life in prison or death if the government “proves an aggravating factor (such as that the offense involved kidnapping, aggravated sexual abuse, or resulted in death)”, per the DoJ. Five people, a mix of police officers and rioters, did die during the January 6 insurrection, but, as The Washington Post noted, nowhere in the lengthy indictment against Mr Trump are prosecutors arguing the former president is responsible for any such aggravating circumstances. (Police officer Michael Byrd, who shot January 6 rioter Ashli Babbitt, was cleared of wrongdoing by the DoJ and the Capitol police in April of 2021, and two of the men who attacked Brian Sicknick, a Washington police officer who died during the insurrection, have been sentenced to prison.) Rather, the DoJ is alleging that Mr Trump and his associates knew he lost the election, but launched a multi-part conspiracy to hold onto power anyway, a scheme that included spreading false claims, attempting to send false slates of electors to Washington, and pressuring officials to meddle with the election certification process. The scheme was largely focused on a handful of counties in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Arizona, and Wisconsin, all of which have large communities of Black and Latino voters, who tend to vote for Democrats. “The attack on our nation’s capitol on January 6, 2021, was an unprecedented assault on the seat of American democracy,” special counsel Jack Smith said Tuesday in a press conference describing the indictment. “As described in the indictment, it was fueled by lies. Lies by the defendant targeted at obstructing a bedrock function of the US government – the nation’s process of collecting, counting and certifying the results of the presidential election.” As Sean Morales-Doyle, director of the voting rights and elections programme at the Brennan Center for Justice at the NYU School of Law, told The Independent, the civil rights statute in question has been used to prosecute officials for attempting to alter election results in the past. He pointed to the example of the 1915 case US v Mosley, where Oklahoma officials were punished for trying to exclude votes from a final tally. “If you read that case, you’d never be able to tell that it’s about race. And there’s not a word about race mentioned, but that’s really the story underlying it,” Mr Morales-Doyle told The Independent. “And that’s really, throughout our nation’s history, the battle over our democracy. The battle over the right to vote has not always but pretty consistently also been a fight that has race at its heart,” he added. “And that’s true now still, and I think it is an overlooked thread underlying much of the story about Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election.” Prosecutors may not be arguing Mr Trump caused conduct worthy of the death penalty, but the former president’s sentencing still will be a delicate issue. "Possible jail time for Donald Trump if he’s convicted of one, some, or all the criminal cases is a fascinating but speculative business," former federal prosecutor Michael McAuliffe told Newsweek. "As for the federal cases charging Trump with crimes, the sentencing guidelines – which assign numerical values to various factors to create a range for a presumptive sentence – will prove inadequate." In regards to Mr Trump, both "the crimes and the defendant are singular.” Alex Woodward contributed reporting to this story. Read More Trump’s election fraud claims were always bogus. Will his history of lies finally catch up to him? 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