MANILA, Philippines\u00a0\u2014\u00a0U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned Asian leaders Wednesday that Iran\u2019s demand to control and collect tolls in the Strait of Hormuz would threaten the world\u2019s economy and set a precedent that could be repeated elsewhere in the world.<\/p>\n
Rubio spoke at the start of an annual meeting in the Philippine capital, Manila, with counterparts from the Assn. of Southeast Asian Nations who have expressed alarm over the resurgent fighting in the Middle East that has battered their region. Despite Washington\u2019s preoccupation with Iran, Rubio said, \u201cWe\u2019re with ASEAN 100%.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we create a precedent in the Middle East where a nation-state can decide that they are going to control an international waterway, charge a toll and if you don\u2019t pay them, blow up your ships, we have created a very dangerous precedent, which will repeat itself in other parts of the world, including in this region,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Washington\u2019s top diplomat also renewed allegations that Iran has reneged on commitments under a collapsed interim ceasefire deal. Rubio said Iran \u201chas been reaching out to the United States, both directly and indirectly, to engage in talks about settling the differences.\u201d He said that while \u201cthe U.S. would love to reach a diplomatic settlement,\u201d the Trump administration is \u201cnot going to sit by and let ships be blown up or Americans be attacked.\u201d<\/p>\n
Top diplomats from the U.S., China, Russia and several other countries are in Manila this week to take part in at the ASEAN ministerial gathering. Newly minted British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband was arriving Wednesday, his office said.<\/p>\n
Sergey Lavrov, Russia\u2019s foreign minister, told reporters that Moscow would like to see a quick settlement between the U.S. and Iran.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are those eager to incite each party to keep the conflict going, but we aren\u2019t one of those,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe would like to see it stop \u2014 it impacts the global economy and Russia is part of the global economy,\u201d Lavrov said, adding that Moscow is \u201cinterested in stable global energy prices to pursue long-term economic policies.\u201d<\/p>\n
Southeast Asia hit hard by energy shock from Iran war<\/p>\n
Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong underscored her country\u2019s concern over the renewed attacks in the Middle East, warning that \u201cthe situation could deteriorate further without much warning.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to see an end to this war. We want to see a ceasefire. We want to see negotiations and we want the strait to be opened,\u201d Wong told reporters.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople are being affected by what is happening and has happened to global energy markets and the effect on people has been direct and personal,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Overreliance on fossil fuel imports from the Middle East has made Southeast Asia particularly vulnerable to the energy shock triggered by the Iran war, according to the International Energy Agency, which called the crisis a \u201cstark wake-up call\u201d for the region\u2019s energy security.<\/p>\n
Asian markets imported about 80% of the crude oil and almost 90% of the liquefied natural gas transiting through the Strait of Hormuz in 2025, the IEA said.<\/p>\n
Rubio and allies reaffirm commitment to counter growing Chinese influence<\/p>\n
Rubio also met with counterparts in the four-nation Quad partnership, which is made up of the U.S., Australia, India and Japan. They discussed maritime and transnational security, among other issues, and issued a joint statement that reaffirmed their commitment to maritime security initiatives aiming to counter China\u2019s growing influence in the region.<\/p>\n
During the meeting, Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi voiced strong opposition to any attempts to change the status quo by force in the region, including in the disputed South China Sea and East China Sea, where China\u2019s increasingly aggressive actions have sparked concern.<\/p>\n
Tokyo has a long-running dispute over Japan-controlled islands, which Beijing also claims, in the East China Sea.<\/p>\n
Wong echoed his concern, saying, \u201cWe have real concerns about behavior that is destabilizing and risky.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Trump administration has repeatedly criticized China\u2019s assertive actions in the South China Sea to the disadvantage of smaller claimant countries like the Philippines, Washington\u2019s oldest treaty ally in Asia. <\/p>\n
Rubio met separately with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, telling reporters later that they discussed a new altercation this week between Chinese and Filipino forces in a disputed shoal. Rubio called the incident \u201cescalatory.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt speaks to areas of disagreement when it comes to our policies with China,\u201d Rubio said. \u201cThose need to be managed very carefully, because obviously, a conflict \u2014 be it economic or otherwise \u2014 between the U.S. and China would have a dramatic global impact.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said they also talked about a trade board \u2014 which is meant to allow the two governments to discuss certain goods \u2014 and that he hopes it can be a \u201cdeliverable\u201d from a planned meeting in the U.S. in September between President Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping.<\/p>\n
ASEAN foreign ministers discussed the territorial disputes Tuesday, welcoming progress in years-long negotiations between China and their regional bloc on a proposed non-aggression pact that aims to prevent a major conflict in the disputed waters that could draw in the United States.<\/p>\n
Rubio and Lavrov to discuss Ukraine<\/p>\n
Rubio said he will meet Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, on Thursday and discuss the war in Ukraine. He suggested he also would use the meeting to find other areas of potential cooperation between the U.S. and Russia.<\/p>\n
He said the U.S. remains open to playing a role in ending the conflict \u201cif that opportunity presents itself.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rubio said those efforts have \u201ckind of fallen off a little bit over the last few months\u201d but he will use the meeting with Lavrov to see if there\u2019s an opportunity to renew talks.<\/p>\n
Lavrov, meanwhile, said he will ask Rubio about Trump\u2019s claim that a settlement on the war in Ukraine is getting close.<\/p>\n
Rubio also met with his Indian counterpart, External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, a U.S. official said. They discussed both regional issues and the Iran war, along with a yet-to-be completed trade agreement to lower Trump\u2019s tariffs on Indian goods.<\/p>\n
Price and Gomez write for the Associated Press. Associated Press journalists Haruka Nuga and Anton Delgado in Bangkok and Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MANILA, Philippines\u00a0\u2014\u00a0U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned Asian leaders Wednesday that Iran\u2019s demand to control and collect…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":218407,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3],"tags":[63066,262,693,63067,102,34,49,722,398,10203,55,17018,26533,1219,683],"class_list":["post-218406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-iran","tag-annual-meeting","tag-china","tag-concern","tag-dangerous-precedent","tag-hormuz","tag-iran","tag-middle-east","tag-president-trump","tag-region","tag-rubio","tag-russia","tag-sergey-lavrov","tag-south-china-sea","tag-strait","tag-u-s"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116964576642897508","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218406"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218406\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/218407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}