CNN: President Donald Trump said it’s Iran’s “last chance” to sign a deal with the US, after again calling off strikes and promising to continue talks at the request of Persian Gulf allies. He made the threat after claiming that talks between the US and Iran would start today and that a Strait of Hormuz deal was in place. Iran has denied any negotiations are ongoing.
Strait of Hormuz: Iran’s Foreign Ministry says it is in talks with Oman to establish a safe, “temporary” route for vessels through the critical waterway, adding that these negotiations have no bearing on whether it is “open or closed.”…
“We currently do not have negotiations with America,” and Iran has no plans to host foreign delegations or send negotiators abroad in the coming days, Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei told reporters…
How Iran is widening its pressure campaign to force US concessions
Rather than seeking a decisive military victory, Tehran is pursuing a strategy of calibrated escalation aimed at widening the conflict without triggering full-scale war.
The goal, they say, is to convince the United States and its allies that containing the crisis is more costly than accommodating Iran’s demands over the Strait of Hormuz.
The message from Tehran is that unless Washington accepts a new status quo that gives Iran a greater role in Hormuz, the conflict could spread beyond the Gulf…
The finding, in a poll conducted Wednesday through Monday, showed how Trump’s handling of the economy, including rising energy prices resulting from the Iran war, could weigh on his party’s chances in the November midterm elections that will determine control of Congress for the next two years…