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Because the US and Iran hold their second round of talks about Iran’s nuclear programme in Geneva, Iran shut down a key maritime strait and issued a direct threat to the US.
Negotiations with the US today are focused on Iran’s nuclear programme, and won’t deal with the country’s bloody crackdown on protesters, for which Donald Trump threatened to make use of force on the country.
Talking to reporters on Monday night aboard Air Force One on his method to Washington, Trump said he planned to be involved within the talks, a minimum of not directly.
‘I believe they need to make a deal. I don’t think they need the implications of not making a deal,’ he said.
Today, the Strait of Hormuz has been shut for several hours for ‘safety and maritime concerns’ as Ali Khamenei’s forces hold live fire military exercises.
That is the primary time that Iran has closed parts of the Strait, a necessary international waterway, for the reason that US began threatening Iran with military motion. There are reports that Russian and Chinese ships joined Iranian ships for the exercises.
Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi, who’s leading the talks for Iran, said: ‘I’m in Geneva with real ideas to realize a good and equitable deal. What will not be on the table: submission before threats.’
Just hours later, Khamenei’s official social media account posted: ‘The US President keeps saying that they’ve the strongest military force on the planet.
‘The strongest military force on the planet may at times be struck so hard that it cannot stand up again.’
Khamenei has stepped up his warnings to the US over its build-up of military forces within the Middle East.
‘In fact, a warship is a dangerous apparatus, but more dangerous than the warship is the weapon that may sink the warship into the depths of the ocean,’ he threatened.
The Ayatollah appears to be referencing Trump sending the USS Gerald R Ford, the world’s largest aircraft carrier, from the Caribbean Sea to the Middle East to hitch other warships and military assets the US has built up within the region.
The Ford will join the USS Abraham Lincoln and its accompanying guided-missile destroyers, which have been within the region for greater than two weeks.
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