Munir Ahmed, Jon Gambrell and David Rising
The US Navy’s forcible seizure of an Iranian-flagged cargo ship has thrown doubt on an announcement from President Donald Trump that US negotiators were on their way to Pakistan for another round of talks with Iran.
Trump’s announcement on Sunday (US time) had raised hopes of extending a fragile ceasefire set to expire by Wednesday, but Iran has not confirmed it will attend.
Trump also said the US forcibly seized the cargo ship that tried to circumvent a naval blockade near the Strait of Hormuz on Sunday (US time), the first such interception since the blockade of Iranian ports began last week.
He said a US Navy guided missile destroyer in the Gulf of Oman “stopped them right in their tracks by blowing a hole in the engineroom” and that US Marines had custody of the vessel, named Touska, and were “seeing what’s on board!”
US Central Command released a message sent by a US mariner to the Iranian-flagged tanker in a video posted on X, saying it shows the moments before the US seized Touska for crossing the US-imposed blockade line in the Gulf of Oman.
“Motor vessel Touska, Motor vessel Touska. Vacate your engine room. Vacate your engine room. We are about to subject you to disabling fire,” can be heard in the video. Later, three rounds are fired, leaving smoke in their wake.
CENTCOM said its fire targeted the vessel’s engine room before forces seized the ship. It said Touska was headed to the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas and ignored multiple US warnings over six hours to evacuate the engine room. The USS Spruance then fired, after which Marines boarded and took hold of the ship.
“American forces acted in a deliberate, professional, and proportional manner to ensure compliance,” it wrote on X.
Iran’s joint military command said Tehran would respond soon and called the US seizure an act of piracy. The regime maintains that the US blockade is illegal.
The escalating standoff threatened to deepen the energy crisis roiling the global economy and push the two countries toward renewed fighting.
Observed transits of commercial ships through the Strait of Hormuz have come to a halt following a brief surge on Saturday. No crossings were seen on Sunday, according to tracking data compiled by Bloomberg.
At least 13 oil tankers turned back toward the Persian Gulf on Saturday, abandoning attempts to leave that began after Iran announced a day earlier that the strait was open.
Since the war started, at least 3375 people have been killed in Iran, according to a new toll released Monday in official Iranian media by Abbas Masjedi, the head of Iran’s Legal Medicine Organisation.
He did not break down casualties among civilians and security forces, instead saying that 2875 were male and 496 were female. Masjedi said 383 of the dead were children 18 years old and under.
“The choice is clear: either a free oil market for all or the risk of significant costs for everyone.”
Mohammad Reza Aref, Iran’s first vice president
More than 2290 people have been killed in Lebanon, 23 in Israel and more than a dozen in Gulf Arab states. Fifteen Israeli soldiers in Lebanon and 13 US service members throughout the region have been killed.
Iran’s first vice president, Mohammad Reza Aref, said global fuel prices could stabilise only if economic and military pressures on Iranian oil exports end.
Security of the strait was not free and “the choice is clear: either a free oil market for all or the risk of significant costs for everyone” Aref said in a social media post calling for a lasting end to military and economic pressure on Tehran.
“One cannot restrict Iran’s oil exports while expecting free security for others,” Aref wrote on X.
Oil prices have climbed more than 5 per cent as the standoff between Iran and the US stops tankers from using the Strait of Hormuz.
US benchmark crude gained 6 per cent to $US87.51 a barrel, while Brent crude, the international standard, was at $US95.26 a barrel – up more than 30 per cent from the day the war started.
With the two-week ceasefire between the US and Iran set to expire Wednesday, Pakistan has intensified diplomatic contacts with both Washington and Tehran over the past 24 hours with the goal of resuming the talks on Tuesday as planned, according to two Pakistani officials involved in the preparations. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak to the press.
Trump has said American negotiators would head to the Pakistani capital on Monday, but it was not immediately clear whether those plans would now change. Iran has not officially commented on possible talks, but Iranian state media, citing anonymous sources, issued brief reports suggesting that they would not happen.
Meanwhile, Iran said on Monday it had hanged two men it accused of setting fire to buildings on behalf of the Israeli intelligence service Mossad.
An Iranian exiled opposition group earlier claimed the men as members and alleged their charges stemmed from events that happened after they already had detained.
The Mizan news agency of Iran’s judiciary identified the men hanged as Mohammad Masoum Shahi and Hamed Validi. The Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MEK) opposition group identified Shahi as Nima Shahi. The MEK said the men had been “subjected to interrogation and torture” and convicted over an incident that happened before their detention.
This brings to eight the total number of MEK members executed since the start of the war.
Activists and rights groups say Iran routinely holds closed-door trials in which defendants are unable to challenge the accusations they face.
In Lebanon, Hezbollah said it detonated explosives on Sunday afternoon in an attack against Israeli forces in southern Lebanon.
The group said in a statement on Monday that bombs planted by Hezbollah fighters had exploded and destroyed four tanks in a convoy of eight tanks that was passing the village of Deir Siryan.
It was the first claim of an attack by Hezbollah since a 10-day ceasefire went into effect at midnight Thursday. The Israeli military did not immediately comment.
AP, Bloomberg
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