Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard launched drone and missile attacks on Bahrain and Kuwait on Sunday, responding to US airstrikes on the Islamic Republic and warning that a “complete halt” could come to negotiations to end the war if Washington continues its attacks.
The attacks came as a US Navy-overseen multinational maritime body said on Saturday it would expand a route near Oman in the Strait of Hormuz for both inbound and outbound traffic, creating another flashpoint with Tehran. An interim US-Iran deal to end the war had called for transits through the strait to resume.
Early on Sunday, the US military’s Central Command said it had struck Iranian military “surveillance infrastructure, communication systems, air defence sites, drone storage facilities and minelayer capabilities” after an attack on a ship at sea early on Saturday. The ship was the Panamanian-flagged tanker Kiku, which was carrying crude oil for Qatar’s state-run energy company. Qatar has been a key negotiator between Iran and the US.
In a social media post, Trump said the US had “struck Iranian missile and drone storage locations, and coastal radar sites, for violating the Cease Fire Agreement, AGAIN!” He warned there could come a point when the US would no longer be able to be reasonable “and will be forced to militarily complete the job”. “If that happens, the Islamic Republic of Iran will no longer exist!” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
The latest exchange followed a similar incident days earlier, when an Iranian drone hit a merchant vessel off the coast of Oman on Thursday and the US military responded with strikes.
According to ship-tracking websites, the Kiku had left a Qatari oil field in the middle of the Persian Gulf earlier in the week and was bound for a port in the United Arab Emirates on the Gulf of Oman, on the other side of the Strait of Hormuz. It appeared to be using a route near the coast of Oman that serves as an alternative to the route backed by Iran through its own waters.
The US military said that “Iran had a chance to honour the ceasefire agreement” but “elected not to” when its forces attacked the Kiku. Iran has twice attacked vessels using the Oman route, which is backed by a United Nations agency, while insisting it must control passage through the waterway despite opposition from the US and Gulf Arab states.
After the US strikes on Sunday, Kuwait’s military said its air defences intercepted incoming Iranian drones and missiles, but gave no immediate details of any damage. Kuwait hosts a major US Army base.
Bahrain’s Foreign Ministry denounced what it called “a dangerous escalation” that showed Tehran’s actions were “not a passing act, nor an isolated incident, but rather a deliberate approach and a systematic pattern of repeated aggression against the sovereignty of the kingdom, and the security of its citizens and residents”. Bahrain hosts the US Navy’s 5th Fleet, whose base there came under repeated attack during the war.
The Revolutionary Guard claimed responsibility for both attacks and said it had targeted Al Asad Air Base in Kuwait. “Let the enemy know that violating the ceasefire … will lead to a complete halt of ongoing processes,” it said. The Guard, which controls Iran’s ballistic missile arsenal, answers only to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei and is believed to be wielding greater influence in the Islamic Republic.
The latest developments marked another escalation in the conflict, with Iran attacking Bahrain and Kuwait after US strikes, tensions rising again around shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, and both sides warning that the ceasefire and wider negotiations could break down.
With PTI Inputs
– Ends
Source link
[ad_3]
