(AFP) – Iran’s top diplomat warned Sunday that any attempt by shipping to bypass its preferred route through the Strait of Hormuz would “increase tensions” in the Middle East, as US and Iranian forces again traded attacks across the vital seaway. The exchanges underscored the fragility of a Pakistan-brokered agreement aimed at ending the war launched by the United States and Israel in February, which disrupted shipping through the strait and rattled global energy markets. Although a ceasefire took effect in April, sporadic violence has continued in the Gulf region, with ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz often the spark.
Early on Sunday, US Central Command (CENTCOM) said it had attacked 10 Iranian military targets over “continued Iranian aggression against commercial shipping”. Iran then said it had carried out retaliatory strikes against US bases in Kuwait and Bahrain in response. Both Kuwait and Bahrain denounced the attacks. Tehran has continued to insist on controlling passage through the vital strait, through which a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas travel in normal times, something it did not have before the war. At the moment, Iran insists ships transiting the strait pass through a corridor close to its own shores, though this week dozens of vessels have travelled along the opposite side of the waterway, hugging the Omani coast.
“Any attempt to adopt new or separate arrangements compared to what is underway by the Islamic Republic of Iran, will only lead to more complicated situations and delays in the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, and will increase the tensions,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said. “I urge all parties… to adhere to the memorandum of understanding and not to allow this MoU to deviate from its course.” Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said Sunday they were taking measures to control traffic in the strait and that vessels in violation of those measures would be dealt with more firmly than before. Mohammad Mokhber, adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, wrote on X that as long as Iran managed the strait, Washington’s “hegemonic dreams in the region will not be realised”.
In the memorandum of understanding reached this month — aimed at putting a lasting end to the war — Iran had agreed to “safe passage of commercial vessels with no charge, for 60 days only, from the Persian Gulf to the Sea of Oman, and vice versa” in the strait.
Experts said there would likely be more Hormuz incidents. For Iran, “a drawn-out negotiation accompanied by controlled pressure in the strait can work to its advantage,” said HA Hellyer, of London think tank the Royal United Services Institute. The agreement signed by the US and Iran said both countries, and their respective allies, were “not to initiate any war or any military operation against each other and to refrain from the threat or use of force against each other”. But both countries have since traded accusations of violating their fragile ceasefire.
US President Donald Trump said on Saturday that Iran would “no longer exist” if the US were “forced” to resume the war. “United States aircraft just struck Iranian missile and drone storage locations, and coastal radar sites, for violating the Cease Fire Agreement, AGAIN!” Trump wrote on Truth Social. CENTCOM said the strikes were in response to an Iranian drone attack on the Panama-flagged oil tanker “Kiku”. Washington had carried out similar strikes on Friday.
Israel, meanwhile, launched strikes in Lebanon as Hezbollah’s leader Naim Qassem rejected a deal to end that conflict, which has also threatened to derail the wider US-Iran peace effort. Iran called them “a blatant violation” of the truce deal. Hezbollah lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah warned on Sunday of “internal conflict” in Lebanon over the country’s agreement with Israel, signed this week, predicting the deal would not be implemented. The agreement, which aims to pave the way to peace between the neighbours, includes plans to disarm Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.
Lebanon was drawn into the Middle East war in early March, when Hezbollah launched rockets at Israel in support of Iran, and Israel responded with heavy airstrikes and a ground invasion. Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei said Sunday that Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon was “an essential condition for reaching a final and lasting agreement” that establishes security in the region. Iran’s chief negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, meanwhile, said Iran was “seriously pursuing this issue” of ending the Israeli occupation in Lebanon in a call with Lebanese speaker of parliament Nabih Berri.
On Sunday, Lebanese state media reported a new Israeli strike on the country’s south, while the Israeli military said a soldier was killed in fighting in southern Lebanon.
burs-dcp/dc – by AFP teams in Tehran, Washington, Jerusalem, Beirut, Manama and Kuwait City
© 2024 AFP
