Trump says Iran talks ongoing to open Hormuz ‘literally by tomorrow’, but Tehran denies negotiations

New York: Even as US President Donald Trump warned that he was giving Iran a “last chance before decapitation”, he said that they were talking about opening the Strait of Hormuz “literally by tomorrow”.

“I mean they’re going to go quickly, one way or the other. It’s not very complex”, he said on Monday at the Oval Office.

“We’re talking about the Strait, the opening of the Strait, having it open, literally by tomorrow”, he said, but Iran has denied there were any talks with the US.

The contradictory claims leave the gateway to the world for 20 per cent of fossil fuels trapped in uncertainty.

“We are not holding any negotiations with the United States at present”, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei said at a news briefing in Tehran.

Speaking a few hours before Trump, he said that except for Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who is on a pilgrimage to Iraq, all the negotiators were in Iran.

Trump dismissed it, writing on Truth Social, “Iranian Leadership is unbelievably duplicitous” because after they “beg” for a meeting “they say, openly and proudly, that they’re not having any discussions”.

Baqaei did say that Iran was in consultations with Oman, which is across from it on the Strait, for what the Iranian news agency Tasnim described as a “temporary arrangement that would ensure maritime safety in the strategic waterway”.

He said that no other country was involved in Muscat-Tehran talks.

Trump said that he held off the massive bombing campaign he had planned on Sunday because Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and “numerous people” called him to hold off.

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman spoke to Trump on Sunday and, according to the Saudi Press Agency, “emphasised the necessity of prioritising dialogue to reduce tensions and the importance of exerting all possible efforts to achieve a truce that paves the way for diplomatic solutions”.

Trump said Iran was spooked by leaks about the planned attack, “very very hard, harder than any” since World War II and pleaded,”We want to talk. We want to talk about the Strait”.

A Memorandum of Understanding on opening the Strait, where shipping was disrupted after the bombing of Iran, was signed by Trump and Iranian president Masoud Pezeshkian on June 17, but unravelled within weeks after Iran attacked ships in the Strait and the US blockaded Iranian ports.

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who had initiated the February 28 bombing of Iran with the US, met Trump in Washington last week.

Days after the meeting, Trump prepared for the attack, which media reports said could be carried out with Israel.

However, the Gulf and neighbouring countries have a stake in preventing the conflict from flaring up as they bear the direct brunt of Iran’s retaliation.

Iranian attack on a US base in Jordan killed three US Army personnel, one of them of Indian origin, last month.

Iran also hit Bahrain and Kuwait in the resumed confrontation.

A second chokepoint, the Bab al-Mandab Strait that leads to the Red Sea, was also put into play when Iran-allied Houthis in Yemen attacked Saudi oil installations in the area.

That disrupted shipping in the area, which serves as an alternate outlet for some oil, mainly from Saudi Arabia.

IANS