West Asia War: Iran ups threats over naval blockade, but still talking to US
The warning came after President Donald Trump said peace talks could resume this week and Iran confirmed the parties were continuing talks through Pakistan after the first round of talks failed.
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US Vice President J.D. Vance, who led talks over the weekend, said the Islamic Republic had been offered a “grand bargain” to end the six-week war and resolve a decades-old dispute over Tehran’s nuclear program.
But for now, both sides seemed determined to keep up the pressure.
Washington tried to turn things around by blockading ports in Tehran; Overnight, U.S. Central Command said American forces “completely halted economic trade into and out of Iran by sea.”
Also Read | Trump said China will not send weapons to Iran and is ‘very happy’ with the opening of HormuzThe picture, based on the latest maritime monitoring data in the Strait of Hormuz, was less clear, and Iran’s Tasnim news agency reported on Wednesday that shipping was continuing from southern Iran.
But the head of Iran’s military central command warned that US failure to lift the blockade would be “a prelude” to violating the two-week ceasefire.
Ali Abdullahi said Iran’s armed forces “will not allow any exports or imports to continue in the Persian Gulf, the Oman Sea and the Red Sea” unless Washington relents.
Pakistani delegation
Speaking to the New York Post on Tuesday, Trump said a new round of negotiations with Iran could be held in Pakistan “within the next two days,” while telling Fox Business that the war was “very close to being over.”
On the Iranian side, a foreign ministry spokesman said “several messages” had been exchanged through Islamabad since the talks concluded on Sunday and that Tehran would “most likely” receive a Pakistani delegation on Wednesday.
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Stocks rose and crude oil fell on hopes of reaching a deal that would get oil flowing again through the Strait of Hormuz, which has been blocked by Iranian forces since the U.S.-Israeli offensive began in late February and is now the focus of a U.S. blockade.
Analysts say Trump aims not only to cut off Iran’s revenue but also to pressure China, the largest buyer of Iranian oil, to reopen the strait.
Pointing to China’s potentially key role, Trump told Fox Business that he wrote a letter to Xi Jinping asking him not to supply weapons to Tehran and received assurances from the Chinese leader that he had not done so.
great bargain
Trump insisted that any deal must permanently prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. He launched the war on February 28, arguing that Tehran was rushing to complete the atomic bomb; this claim was not supported by the UN nuclear watchdog.
Reports stated that during the Islamabad talks, the USA wanted Iran’s uranium enrichment program to be suspended for 20 years, and in return, Iran offered to suspend its nuclear activities for five years, but US officials rejected this offer.
Tehran has always insisted that its nuclear program is for civilian purposes, and a foreign ministry spokesman said on Wednesday that Iran’s right to enrich uranium was “indisputable” but that the level of enrichment was “negotiable”.
At an event in the US state of Georgia on Tuesday, the US vice president said Trump had promised to “make sure Iran develops” if it “does not have nuclear weapons”.
“This is the kind of Trump-style grand bargain that the President puts on the table,” Vance said, adding: “Man, we’re going to keep negotiating and we’re going to try to make this happen.”
Twin track diplomacy
The latest signals about US-Iran talks came as Israel and Lebanon decided to start direct negotiations after their first high-level face-to-face meeting in Washington since 1993 on Tuesday.
The Trump administration is pressing hard for an end to the conflict between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon, fearing that could jeopardize a broader solution.
The US State Department said “all parties agreed to initiate direct negotiations at a mutually agreed upon time and place.”
But diplomatic efforts remained fragile as the Israeli military said it had hit more than 200 Hezbollah targets in Lebanon in the past 24 hours and the militant group, hostile to any talks, fired dozens of rockets into Israel.
