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Protesters in Seoul, South Korea, shout slogans March 16 against Donald Trump’s demands to multiple countries to send warships to keep the Strait of Hormuz open. (Lee Jin-man\/AP)<\/p>\nCAIRO \u2014 President Donald Trump said Sunday that he has demanded about seven countries send warships to keep the Strait of Hormuz open, but his appeals have brought no commitments as oil prices soar during the Iran war.<\/p>\n
The president declined to name the countries heavily reliant on Middle East crude that the administration is negotiating with to join a coalition to police the waterway where about one-fifth of the world\u2019s traded oil normally flows.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m demanding that these countries come in and protect their own territory, because it is their own territory,\u201d Trump said about the strait, claiming the shipping channel is not something the United States needs because of its own access to oil. Trump spoke while answering reporters\u2019 questions as he flew back to Washington from Florida aboard Air Force One.<\/p>\n
Trump said China gets about 90% of its oil from the strait, while the U.S. gets a minimal amount. He declined to discuss whether China will join the coalition.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would be nice to have other countries police that with us, and we\u2019ll help. We\u2019ll work with them,\u201d Trump said. Previously, he has appealed to China, France, Japan, South Korea and Britain.<\/p>\n
Protesters in Seoul, South Korea, shout slogans March 16 against Donald Trump’s demands to multiple countries to send warships to keep the Strait of Hormuz open. (Lee Jin-man\/AP)<\/p>\n
Iran\u2019s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi earlier told CBS that Tehran has been \u201capproached by a number of countries\u201d seeking safe passage for their vessels, \u201cand this is up to our military to decide.\u201d He said a group of vessels from \u201cdifferent countries\u201d had been allowed to pass, without providing details.<\/p>\n
Iran has said the strait is open to all except the United States and its allies.<\/p>\n
Araghchi added that \u201cwe don\u2019t see any reason why we should talk with Americans\u201d about finding a way to end the war, noting that Israel and the U.S. started the fighting with coordinated attacks on Feb. 28 during indirect U.S.-Iran talks on Iran\u2019s nuclear program. He also said Tehran had \u201cno plan to recover\u201d the enriched uranium that is under rubble following U.S. and Israeli attacks last year.<\/p>\n
Countries are cautious after Trump\u2019s call<\/p>\n
U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright told NBC earlier Sunday that he has been \u201cin dialogue\u201d with some of the countries Trump had mentioned previously, and said he expected China \u201cwill be a constructive partner\u201d in reopening the strait.<\/p>\n
But countries made no promises.<\/p>\n
Britain said Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Sunday discussed with Trump the importance of reopening the strait \u201cto end the disruption to global shipping,\u201d and spoke with Canada\u2019s prime minister about it separately.<\/p>\n
Aboard Air Force One, Trump specifically named Starmer, who he said initially declined to put British aircraft carriers \u201cinto harm\u2019s way.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhether we get support or not, but I can say this, and I said to them: We will remember,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for China\u2019s embassy to the U.S., Liu Pengyu, said previously that \u201call parties have the responsibility to ensure stable and unimpeded energy supply\u201d and that China would \u201cstrengthen communication with relevant parties\u201d for de-escalation.<\/p>\n
South Korea\u2019s Foreign Ministry said it \u201ctakes note\u201d of Trump\u2019s call and that it \u201cwill closely coordinate and carefully review\u201d the situation with the U.S.<\/p>\n
Expectations are high that Trump will ask Japan directly when Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi meets him on Thursday at the White House.<\/p>\n
France previously said it is working with countries \u2014 President Emmanuel Macron mentioned partners in Europe, India and Asia \u2014 on a possible international mission to escort ships through the strait but has stressed it must be when \u201cthe circumstances permit,\u201d when fighting has subsided.<\/p>\n
Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul of Germany, which was not mentioned in Trump\u2019s call, told ARD television: \u201cWill we soon be an active part of this conflict? No.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, emergency oil stocks \u201cwill soon start flowing to global markets,\u201d the International Energy Agency said Sunday, describing the collective action to lower prices \u201cby far the largest ever.\u201d<\/p>\n
It updated last week\u2019s announcement of 400 million barrels to nearly 412 million. Asian member countries plan to release stocks \u201cimmediately,\u201d and reserves from Europe and the Americas will be released \u201cfrom the end of March.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump didn\u2019t directly answer whether his administration is talking about selling oil futures as a way to cap surging oil prices.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe prices are going to come tumbling down as soon as it\u2019s over. And it\u2019s going to be over pretty quickly,\u201d he told reporters.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CAIRO \u2014 President Donald Trump said Sunday that he has demanded about seven countries send warships to keep…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22060,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[211,5328,262,5826,1530,1529,1528,38,382,102,389,49,2540,1488,106,101],"class_list":{"0":"post-22059","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-strait-of-hormuz","8":"tag-abbas-araghchi","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-china","11":"tag-chris-wright","12":"tag-circulated-defense-news","13":"tag-circulated-military-times","14":"tag-circulated-navy-times","15":"tag-donald-trump","16":"tag-france","17":"tag-hormuz","18":"tag-japan","19":"tag-middle-east","20":"tag-military-times","21":"tag-navy","22":"tag-south-korea","23":"tag-strait-of-hormuz"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116239981860196963","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22059","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=22059"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22059\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}