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US Navy to enforce blockade, Trump says after condemning Iran for blocking waterway and complaining no agreement reached in Islamabad.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n President Donald Trump says the United States Navy will begin blockading the Strait of Hormuz \u201cimmediately\u201d after peace talks between the US and Iran in Pakistan ended without an agreement.<\/p>\n Trump, in a social media post on Sunday, accused Iran of \u201cextortion\u201d and said the US Navy would hunt down and interdict ships in international waters that have paid Iran a toll to traverse the strait.<\/span><\/p>\n list of 3 items<\/span>end of list<\/span><\/section>\n \u201cSo, there you have it, the meeting went well, most points were agreed to, but the only point that really mattered, NUCLEAR, was not,\u201d Trump said. \u201cEffective immediately, the United States Navy, the Finest in the World, will begin the process of BLOCKADING any and all Ships trying to enter, or leave, the Strait of Hormuz.\u201d<\/p>\n Iran has essentially taken control over the Strait of Hormuz, a vital chokepoint for the global energy market, since the US and Israel launched a war on Iran on February 28.<\/p>\n Traffic through the narrow strait has slowed to a trickle, nearly paralysing about one-fifth of the world\u2019s oil and liquefied natural gas shipments and sending shock waves through the global economy.<\/p>\n Trump\u2019s comments have raised concerns about the status of the fragile two-week ceasefire.<\/p>\n \u201cThese two posts by the US president are very bombastic, very long, very detailed, and seem to be filled with a great deal of frustration,\u201d Al Jazeera correspondent Zein Basravi said from Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are no doubt alarm bells ringing here in the GCC [Gulf Cooperation Council] for countries that were hoping this ceasefire would extend beyond those two weeks and become a consistent, long-term negotiated peace that could perhaps lead to different relationships forming in the region, but certainly to an end to the violence we see.\u201d<\/p>\n Mediators have urged both parties to prioritise diplomacy and avoid a return to fighting.<\/p>\n \u201cI urge that the ceasefire be extended and talks continue,\u201d Oman\u2019s Foreign Minister Badr Albusaidi said in a social media post on Sunday. \u201c<\/span>Success may require everyone to make painful concessions, but this is nothing as compared to the pain of failure and war.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Iran has denied US claims that two of its warships recently passed through the strait for mine-clearing operations, warning that any military vessels seeking to do so would receive a \u201cstrong response\u201d. Trump called Iran\u2019s control over the waterway \u201cworld extortion\u201d in his social media post and added that any Iranian forces who fire at US forces or \u201cpeaceful vessels\u201d would be \u201cBLOWN TO HELL\u201d.<\/p>\n He added that the blockade would involve unspecified \u201cother countries\u201d, and he would not allow Iran to benefit from the closure of the strait. Trump also stated in his social media post that the US Navy would interdict \u201cevery vessel in International Waters that has paid a toll to Iran\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re not going to let Iran make money on selling oil to people that they like,\u201d Trump told Fox News in an interview later on Sunday. \u201cIt\u2019s going to be all or none, and that\u2019s the way it is.\u201d<\/p>\n Democratic lawmakers in the US have criticised Trump\u2019s comments.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t understand how blockading the strait is somehow going to push the Iranians into opening it,\u201d Senator Mark Warner, a Democrat, said during an interview with CNN.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t see the connection there,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Iran has continued to send its own ships through the strait since the war began and has allowed a handful of vessels from other countries to pass through. Iranian officials have also discussed setting up a toll system after the fighting ends,\u00a0under which users would\u00a0pay Iran a fee to cross<\/span>\u00a0the strait.<\/p>\n \u201cIran knows that controlling the Strait of Hormuz is still their main leverage,\u201d Al Jazeera correspondent Ali Hashem reported from the Iranian capital of Tehran. \u201cThe higher the tensions, the more prices surge, and this affects the global economy.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n US Navy to enforce blockade, Trump says after condemning Iran for blocking waterway and complaining no agreement reached in Islamabad. President Donald Trump says the United States Navy will begin blockading the Strait of Hormuz \u201cimmediately\u201d after peace talks between the US and Iran in Pakistan ended without an agreement. Trump, in a social media […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18665,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-us-canada-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18664"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18664\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18665"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Recommended Stories <\/h2>\n
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