Iran will not reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for a “temporary ceasefire”, an unidentified senior Iranian official told Reuters on Monday. The official also said that Tehran views Washington as lacking readiness for a permanent ceasefire.

The ‌official confirmed Iran had received Pakistan’s ⁠proposal for an immediate ‌ceasefire and was reviewing it, adding that Tehran ‌does not accept being pressured to ⁠accept deadlines and make ⁠a decision, the news agency reported.

The United States has not yet responded to Pakistan’s plan.

Advertisement

Here are more top updates from the conflict in West Asia:

  • At a press conference in Tehran, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei said Iran would defend itself with “all its might” when necessary, Al Jazeera reported. He accused the United States and Israel of having “no red lines” and disregarding international law.
  • US President Donald Trump on Sunday appeared to extend by 24 hours his deadline for Iran to arrive at a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz or face attacks on its critical infrastructure. “Tuesday, 8.00 pm Eastern Time!” he said on social media, without providing context. It would be 5.30 am on Wednesday in India.
  • The US president’s 10-day deadline was to expire on Monday. He has been threatening to bomb the country’s energy, water and oil infrastructure if no agreement was finalised to reopen the maritime chokepoint. The new deadline would mean another day for Tehran to consider a deal with Trump.
  • In a social media post laden with expletives, Trump on Sunday threatened to bomb Iran’s power plants and bridges starting Tuesday if the country does not reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
  • Later on Sunday, Trump told Fox News that he believed that there was a “good chance” of making a deal with Iran on Monday. “They are negotiating now,” the US president claimed. “If they don’t make a deal and fast, I’m considering blowing everything up and taking over the oil.”
  • Dismissing Trump’s latest threats, Iranian Culture Minister Sayed Reza Salihi-Amiri told the Associated Press that the US president was an “unstable, delusional figure”. “Iranian society generally does not pay attention to his statements, as it believes he lacks personal, behavioural and verbal balance, and constantly shifts between contradictory positions,” Salihi-Amiri was quoted as saying.
  • Following Trump’s threats, the price of benchmark Brent crude spiked marginally to $110 per barrel on Monday from between $105 per barrel and $108 per barrel on Thursday. The price was $78 per barrel on February 27, a day before the conflict started.
  • Iran and the US have received a draft proposal that calls for a 45-day ceasefire and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, Axios and AP quoted unidentified officials as saying on Monday. The 45-day window will act as a stepping stone, providing time for detailed talks to end the war, according to the proposal. It is unclear if Tehran and Washington view favourably the proposal made by Egypt, Turkey and Pakistan.
  • India’s External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said on Sunday that he had received a call from Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and that they “discussed the present situation”. Neither Jaishankar nor Araghchi provided more details of what was discussed.
  • Ali Akbar Velayati, a senior advisor to Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, warned on Sunday that global energy flows and international trade would be further disrupted with “a single move” if the US and Israel escalate their attacks, state-owned Press TV reported.
  • Velayati was quoted as saying that the Iran-backed forces in West Asia view the strategic Bab al-Mandeb strait, which connects the Arabian Sea to the Red Sea, as equivalent in importance to the Strait of Hormuz. The Bab al-Mandeb strait is important for most ships that pass through the Suez Canal.
  • Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps stated that its intelligence chief, Majid Khademi, was killed in a United States-Israeli strike on Monday. Khademi is the latest high-ranking Iranian official to be killed since the assassination of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on February 28. Last month, Iran’s security chief Ali Larijani and head of the paramilitary Basij force, Gholamreza Soleimani, were killed in strikes. Just a day after their killing, Iran’s intelligence minister Esmail Khatib was also killed.
  • The head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog has warned that attacks near Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant “pose a very real danger to nuclear safety and must stop”. Strikes near the operating plant “could cause a severe radiological accident with harmful consequences for people and the environment in Iran and beyond,” International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said in a social media post on Monday.
  • He added that one recent strike hit just 75 metres from the plant’s perimeter. The facility, located in the south of the country and equipped with a 1,000-megawatt reactor, has been targeted four times since the conflict in West Asia began. The latest strike was reported by Iranian state media on Saturday.

The war

The US and Israel launched an attack on Iran on February 28, claiming that Tehran’s action posed an existential threat to Israel. Washington acts as a guarantor of Israel’s security. Iran has retaliated by striking Israel and US military bases in the region and targeting major cities in Gulf countries.

Tehran has also effectively blocked the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterbody connecting the Gulf to the Arabian Sea, for most international commercial vessels, triggering a global energy crisis. About 20% of global petroleum supply passes through the maritime chokepoint.

Israel has been claiming that Iran is close to obtaining a nuclear weapon, which could alter the regional security balance. Tehran has long maintained that its nuclear programme is for civilian purposes.