washington
\nThe US military said Saturday it has launched a new round of strikes against Iran, after Tehran \u201cblatantly attacked\u201d a container ship in the Strait of Hormuz.
\nThe latest strikes, which began at 7:15 pm in Washington (2315 GMT), came \u201cafter Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces blatantly attacked\u201d a Cyprus-flagged container ship transiting the Strait of Hormuz, US Central Command said in a statement.
\n\u201cThe United States is imposing a heavy cost by continuing to degrade Iran\u2019s ability to attack civilian mariners and commercial ships freely transiting the strait,\u201d Centcom said, adding that the strikes were being carried out at the direction of President Donald Trump.
\nUS defence secretary Pete Hegseth said simply: \u201cIran made a poor choice. Now they pay.
\nMeanwhile, Iran\u2019s Revolutionary Guards said the Strait of Hormuz would be closed \u201cuntil further notice,\u201d state media reported.
\nThe Guards had fired warning shots at a vessel using an unauthorised route, the reports said.
\nThe move threatens to further complicate efforts to salvage US-Iran negotiations after both sides exchanged strikes over the past few days.
\nEarlier strikes by Tehran on vessels in the strait had triggered exchanges of fire between Iran and the United States, sparking heated rhetoric between the adversaries.
\nA key roadblock to a final agreement is the future of the Strait of Hormuz, with Tehran insisting it will control shipping through the waterway and Washington demanding unrestricted navigation.
\nThe latest strikes came as Iran\u2019s supreme leader vowed revenge for the US-Israeli killing of his father and predecessor, hours after Trump threatened severe reprisals in the event of any attempt on his life.
\nThe tensions threatened an interim agreement aimed at ending the Middle East war, which broke out in late February with massive US-Israeli strikes that killed former supreme leader Ali Khamenei.
\n\u2018Dual-route Hormuz shipping plan\u2019
\nAraqchi and Omani Foreign Minister Badr Albusaidi met in Oman to exchange \u201cviews on appropriate mechanisms for the safe passage of ships through the Strait of Hormuz,\u201d according to a statement from the Iranian foreign minister, Reuters reported.
\nOman\u2019s state news agency said Omani and Iranian negotiators would continue talks \u201cat the technical and political levels.\u201d
\nCNN reported on Saturday that Oman made a draft proposal for the strait, including free navigation through its southern corridor in Omani territorial waters.
\nThe plan called for vessels transiting the northern corridor through Iranian territorial waters to obtain prior approval from Iran, although no tolls would be imposed, CNN said.
\nThe White House and State Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the CNN report.
\nWashington demands that Tehran publicly state it will stop attacks on ships in the strait \u2014 and that all lanes will be open without tolls, senior US officials have said.
\nIran\u2019s Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi has accused the United States of violating the ceasefire agreement. \u201cThere can only be mutual compliance,\u201d he wrote on X on Friday.
\nThe US revoked the licence authorising the sale of Iranian crude on Tuesday after three Qatari and Saudi commercial tankers came under fire earlier in the week, prompting the US to hit Iranian sites. Iran then struck US military sites in Gulf states.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
washington The US military said Saturday it has launched a new round of strikes against Iran, after Tehran \u201cblatantly attacked\u201d a container ship in the Strait of Hormuz. The latest strikes, which began at 7:15 pm in Washington (2315 GMT), came \u201cafter Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces blatantly attacked\u201d a Cyprus-flagged container ship transiting the …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":100179,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-100193","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100193"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100193\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100203,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100193\/revisions\/100203"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/100179"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}