Tensions in the standoff between the US and Iran over the Strait of Hormuz intensified yesterday after US President Donald Trump said he ordered the US military to “shoot and kill” small Iranian boats in the strait.
Trump on Thursday said he “ordered the United States Navy to shoot and kill any boat, small boats though they may be ... that is putting mines in the waters of the Strait of Hormuz.”
Iran has vowed it would keep the strait closed to all but approved vessels for as long as the US Navy blockades its ports, brushing off demands from Trump to reopen Hormuz and surrender its enriched uranium.
Photo: Reuters
Meanwhile, Israel and Lebanon extended a ceasefire by three weeks, Trump said.
Trump announced the truce extension as he met with ambassadors of the two countries and despite recent Israeli strikes in Lebanon and fresh rocket fire from Iran-backed Hezbollah, which was not part of the talks.
“I think there’s a very good chance of having peace. I think it should be an easy one,” Trump told reporters.
The initial truce had been set to expire tomorrow.
Still, the US president said earlier that he was in no rush to end the war with Iran, adding that “the clock is ticking” for the Islamic republic as a third US aircraft carrier — the USS George H.W. Bush — arrived in the Middle East.
Iranian Parliamentary Deputy Speaker Hamidreza Hajibabaei said Iran received its first revenue from tolls it is imposing on ships seeking to cross Hormuz.
Responding to remarks from Trump suggesting that Iranian leadership was “seriously fractured,” the Islamic republic’s president, parliament speaker and chief justice all posted a nearly identical message on social media.
“One God, one nation, one leader, and one path; that path being the path to the victory of our dearer-than-life Iran,” they all said.
In Beijing, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday rejected an accusation by Trump that an Iranian-flagged cargo ship intercepted by US forces was a “gift from China.”
Normal trade between countries should not be disturbed, ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun (郭嘉昆) told reporters.
The US earlier this week said that it fired on and seized an Iranian cargo ship that tried to evade its blockade of Iranian ports.
Iran’s military said the ship had been traveling from China and vowed retaliation against what it called “armed piracy by the US military.”
Trump on Tuesday told CNBC that the ship “had some things on it, which wasn’t very nice. A gift from China, perhaps, I don’t know.”
China’s foreign ministry rejected the comments.
“China opposes any accusations and associations that lack a factual basis,” Guo said.
Additional reporting by Reuters
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