NEW YORK – Iran offered to transfer some of its stockpile of highly enriched uranium to a third country in its response to the latest US proposal to end 10 weeks of war, but rejected the idea of dismantling its nuclear facilities, the Wall Street Journal reported.
As a series of incidents continues to threaten a shaky ceasefire, Tehran hasn’t yet given any public indication it would accept Mr Donald Trump’s plan. The US president proposed that Iran permit passage through the Strait of Hormuz and Washington end its blockade on Iranian ports in the next month.
Under the new proposal, Iran would dilute some of its highly enriched uranium and have the rest sent to a third country, the paper said, citing people familiar with the response, but it also called for guarantees the transferred uranium would be returned if talks fail and ruled out dismantling its facilities.
Iran’s response ran several pages, as negotiators proposed an end to the fighting and a gradual reopening of Hormuz, according to the Journal, which noted the two sides remain far apart on the question of Tehran’s nuclear programme.
The conflict has killed thousands of people across the Middle East and sent energy prices soaring. If the two sides reach a deal, they would still need to negotiate later over the details of how to address Iran’s nuclear programme, which remains a critical sticking point.
Mr Trump had warned the US might “go a different route if everything doesn’t get signed up, buttoned up,” suggesting an expanded version of Project Freedom, the brief US effort to break Iran’s maritime stranglehold and escort ships through Hormuz. Roughly a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas flowed through the waterway before the conflict began.
On May 10, Mr Trump said Iran has been “playing games” with the US and other countries. “For 47 years the Iranians have been ‘tapping’ us along, keeping us waiting, killing our people with their roadside bombs, destroying protests, and recently wiping out 42,000 innocent, unarmed protestors, and laughing at our now GREAT AGAIN Country,” he wrote in a social media post. “They will be laughing no longer!”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also warned that the war is “not over.” In an interview airing May 10 on CBS’s 60 Minutes, he said there is more work needed to dismantle Iran’s nuclear capability and to remove its stockpile of highly enriched uranium.
Despite the ceasefire in place since April 8, a drone strike on May 10 briefly set a cargo vessel ablaze off Qatar in the Persian Gulf, marking the latest shipping attack in the region.
The United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, both of which have come under attack from Iran in the past two months, said on May 10 that they had intercepted hostile drones.
Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi also warned the UK and France in a post on X that the presence of its warships in Strait of Hormuz will be met with a “decisive and immediate response from the armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
The conflict that began with US-Israeli strikes on Iran on Feb 28 has upended oil and gas markets, with soaring fuel prices piling pressure on governments and consumers worldwide – including in the US ahead of November’s midterm elections.
Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest oil company, on May 10 warned it would take several months for the market to return to normal even if the Strait of Hormuz reopened immediately.
Should “trade and shipping remain curtailed by more than a few weeks from today, we anticipate the supply disruption to persist, and the market to normalise only in 2027,” Chief Executive Officer Amin Nasser said in a statement.
As the crisis rolls on, the Gulf’s biggest economies have been adapting and finding ways to get at least some of their energy output to market.
Ship-tracking data compiled by Bloomberg showed Al Kharaitiyat, a tanker carrying Qatari liquefied natural gas, transited Hormuz this weekend. It marks Qatar’s first export out of the region since the crisis began and was bound for Pakistan – a major mediator in US-Iran peace discussions.
The shipment is part of Pakistan’s negotiations with Iran to let it obtain extra Qatari LNG cargoes and help meet urgent demand, according to people with knowledge of the matter, who asked not to be identified because the discussions are private.
Meanwhile, Aramco and the UAE’s state oil company Adnoc are among firms that have moved crude cargoes through the strait since Iran effectively closed it, Bloomberg reported on May 8.
Other Saudi exports have been redirected via pipeline to the Red Sea. Aramco reported a 26 per cent jump in first-quarter profit on May 10, following a war-induced rise in prices of oil and refined fuels, and as used this alternative route.
Brent crude, the global benchmark, edged higher to settle around US$101 (S$128) a barrel on May 8, though still notched a weekly drop of about 6 per cent.
US Energy Secretary Chris Wright signalled May 10 on NBC’s Meet the Press that the US may give priority to reopening Hormuz over its demand for an end to Tehran’s nuclear programme.
Asked about the possibility of an interim deal that might not fully address the nuclear issue, he said: “Certainly, that’s got to be possible.” BLOOMBERG
