ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE\/DUBAI
\nU.S. President Donald Trump said \u200bChinese President Xi Jinping had agreed Tehran must reopen the Strait of Hormuz, though China gave no indication it would weigh in.
\nFlying back from Beijing on \u200cFriday after two days of talks with Xi, Trump said he was considering whether to lift U.S. sanctions on Chinese oil companies buying Iranian oil. China is the biggest buyer of Iranian oil.
\n\u201cI\u2019m not asking for any favors because when you ask for favors, you have to do favors in return,\u201d Trump said when asked by a reporter on Air Force One whether Xi had made a firm commitment to put pressure on the Iranians \u200bto reopen the strait.
\nXi did not comment on his discussions with Trump about Iran, although China\u2019s foreign ministry criticized the war, calling it a conflict \u201cwhich should never have happened, \u200bhas no reason to continue\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u2018WE WANT THE STRAITS OPEN\u2019
\nIran has effectively shut the strait, which carried one-fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas supply before the U.S. and Israel launched attacks on February 28. The disruption to shipping has caused the biggest oil supply crisis in history, pushing up oil prices.
\nEbrahim Azizi, who heads the \u200bIranian parliament\u2019s national security committee, said on Saturday that Tehran had prepared a mechanism to manage traffic through the strait along a designated route that would be unveiled soon.
\nAzizi said only commercial vessels \u200band parties cooperating with Iran would benefit, and that fees would be collected for specialised services provided under the mechanism.
\nThousands of Iranians were killed in the U.S. and Israeli airstrikes. Thousands more have been killed in Lebanon in fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed group Hezbollah, though Israel and Lebanon agreed on Friday to a 45-day extension of a ceasefire that has tamped down the conflict there.
\nThe U.S. paused its attacks last month but began a \u200bport blockade. As of Saturday, 78 commercial ships had been redirected and four disabled to ensure compliance with the blockade, the U.S. military said.
\nTehran, which carried out strikes against Israel, U.S. bases \u200band Gulf states after the war began, has said it will not unblock the strait until the U.S. ends its blockade. Trump has threatened to resume attacks if Iran does not agree to a deal.
\n\u201cWe \u200cdon\u2019t want them to have a nuclear weapon, we want the straits open,\u201d Trump said in Beijing, alongside Xi.
\nIran, which has long denied it intends to build a nuclear weapon, has refused to end nuclear research or relinquish its hidden stockpile of enriched uranium.
\nIranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said Tehran had received messages from the U.S. indicating Washington was willing to continue talks.
\nPakistan has been mediating between Washington and Tehran. Iranian news agency Nournews said Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni had held \u201cdetailed\u201d discussions with his visiting Pakistani counterpart on Iran-Pakistan relations and the prospects for resuming peace talks, but gave no \u200bdetails.<\/p>\n
TRUMP LOSING PATIENCE
\nTrump, who told Fox News\u2019 \u201cHannity\u201d program \u200bin an interview aired on Thursday that he was losing patience with Iran, said Tehran \u201cshould make a deal\u201d.
\nOil prices rose around 3% to around $109 a barrel on Friday on concerns about a lack of progress in resolving the conflict.
\nTalks on ending the war, which has become a liability for Trump ahead of U.S. congressional elections \u200bin November, have been on hold since last week when Iran and the U.S. each rejected the other\u2019s most recent proposals.
\nAraqchi said on \u200bFriday that Iran would welcome Chinese input, adding that Tehran was trying to give diplomacy a chance but did not trust the U.S., which has curtailed previous rounds of talks by launching air strikes.
\nWhen the U.S. and Israel launched their attacks on Iran at the end of February, they said one of their aims was to weaken the authorities so Iranians could topple the government.
\nThere has been little sign of organized dissent in Iran during \u200bthe war, and rights groups say the government has cracked down heavily on its opponents.
\nIran\u2019s judiciary said on Saturday \u200bthat 39 people had been executed for collaborating with Israeli or U.S. spy agencies, or taking part in \u201cterror\u201d or armed unrest, since the war started, the judiciary\u2019s news agency Mizan reported.
\nIt said 36 \u201cmedium-level\u201d dissidents had received long prison sentences.
\nReporting by Trevor Hunnicutt and Jana Choukeir. Additional reporting by Reuters Newsrooms, Writing by William Mallard and Timothy Heritage, Editing by Tom Hogue and Mark Potter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE\/DUBAI U.S. President Donald Trump said \u200bChinese President Xi Jinping had agreed Tehran must reopen the Strait of Hormuz, though China gave no indication it would weigh in. Flying back from Beijing on \u200cFriday after two days of talks with Xi, Trump said he was considering whether to lift U.S. sanctions on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":546952,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-546943","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world"],"yoast_head":"\n