Tensions flare up despite global efforts
Iran may block Strait of Hormuz while the US vows to keep it open
Tensions between the United States and Iran further escalated ahead of a key diplomatic meeting in Vienna on Friday, with the Iranian leader threatening to block the Strait of Hormuz and the US vowing to keep the waterway open.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani hinted on Tuesday that Iran could halt regional exports if it is prevented from exporting oil after the US withdrew from the nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, signed in 2015 by Iran and five perma- nent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany and the European Union.
“The Americans have claimed they want to completely stop Iran’s oil exports. They don’t understand the meaning of this statement, because it has no meaning for Iranian oil not to be exported, while the region’s oil is exported,” the website, president.ir, quoted Rouhani as saying.
On Wednesday, the US military pledged to keep the Gulf waterways open to oil tankers.
Captain Bill Urban, a spokesman for the US military’s Central Command, was quoted by The Associated Press on Wednesday that US sailors and regional allies “stand ready to ensure the freedom of navigation and the free flow of commerce wherever international law allows”.
Rouhani said on Wednesday that Iran could reduce its cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN nuclear watchdog. “The responsibility for the change of Iran’s cooperation level with the IAEA falls on those who have created this new situation,” he said.
Bid to save accord
US President Donald Trump pulled the US out of the Iran deal in May. The Trump administration recently told other countries to cut their imports of Iranian oil to zero by Nov 4 or face financial sanctions.
India and Turkey have said they will not do so. The EU has vowed to keep the Iran deal alive without the US, but some EU companies indicated that they have found it difficult in the face of the US sanctions threat.
Rouhani was in Vienna, Austria, on Wednesday in a bid to salvage the JCPOA and said that “if the remaining signatories can guarantee Iran’s benefits, Iran will remain in the nuclear deal without the US”.
Foreign ministers from China, Russia, France, Germany and the United Kingdom will meet Iranian officials in Vienna on Friday to discuss how to keep the agreement alive.
Zha Daojiong, a professor at the School of International Studies at Peking University, said that “it does appear that talk of Nov 4 as the date for a ‘voluntary’ cutoff of oil imports from Iran is meant to maximize impact on punish-Iran supporters among the American voters”.
“If the rest of the signatory governments that signed off on Iran nuclear agreement do not want to see the US making its unilateral sanctions a precedent then they should form a team and take a common position regarding the (veiled) threat to all,” Zha said.
He said the US should be pressed to clarify what specific modification it wants to the 2015 deal and then the five governments should go back to Iran to try to persuade it to start negotiating.
“After all, the course of nonproliferation and the stability of an 80-million strong economy and society (of Iran) are too important to allow such willful acts on the part of the White House,” Zha said.
Caitlin Talmadge, a doctoral candidate in political science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, indicated that Iran does possess significant warfare capabilities, including mines, anti-ship cruise missiles and land-based air defense.
“If Iran were able to properly link these capabilities, it could halt or impede traffic in the Strait of Hormuz for a month or more. US attempts to reopen the waterway likely would escalate rapidly into sustained, large-scale air and naval operations during which Iran could impose significant economic and military costs on the US,” she wrote on Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs website.