Dubai, Apr 22 (AP) US President Donald Trump said the United States was indefinitely extending its ceasefire with Iran as a new round of peace talks was on hold.
Pakistan had planned to host a second round of talks, but the White House suspended Vice President JD Vance's planned trip to Islamabad as Iran rebuffed efforts to restart negotiations.
Iran acknowledged the ceasefire extension but didn't say Tehran was ready to attend a new round of talks to end the war, state television reported Wednesday.
Meanwhile, Iran's semiofficial news agencies are reporting that the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard has attacked a third ship Wednesday in the Strait of Hormuz, throwing into question efforts to end the war.
Nour News, Fars and Mehr all reported the attack by the Guard on a vessel called the Euphoria. They said the vessel had become “stranded” on the Iranian coast, without elaborating. The Guard has seized the other two ships that were attacked, Iranian state television separately reported.
Here is the latest:
Dozens of Israeli civilians attempt to enter Syria
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The Israeli military said it intercepted around 40 Israeli civilians that attempted to enter Syria on Wednesday afternoon. The military said the civilians gathered at the border and then were able to infiltrate several hundred metres into the Israeli-military controlled buffer zone in Syria before being returned to Israel and taken into police custody.
The Israeli media identified the infiltrators as part of the right-wing group “Pioneers of Bashan,” which calls for establishing Jewish settlements in Lebanon and Syria.
Hezbollah says it fired a drone at Israeli post in southern Lebanon
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The group added in a statement that its attack on the post in the southern village of Bayada on Wednesday came in retaliation for Israeli violations of the 10-day ceasefire that went into effect Friday.
The Israeli military said Hezbollah is violating the ceasefire adding that the Iran-backed group launched “a hostile aircraft” toward Israeli soldiers operating in the area of southern Lebanon.
The military said the aircraft was intercepted by Israel's air force and did not cross into Israel.
The Iran war could drive up costs for petroleum-derived products like clothes and crayons
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It might be hard to imagine the Iran war weighing on stuffed toys with names like Snuggle Glove, Bizzikins and Wobblies, but even plush playthings aren't immune when oil shipments from the Middle East are constrained.
Like many soft toys, the creatures developed by a manufacturer in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, are made with polyester and acrylic, synthetic fibres derived from petroleum.
Three weeks after the war started, suppliers in China notified Aleni Brands that getting the materials already was costing them 10 to 15 per cent more, CEO Ricardo Venegas said.
“I think this situation demonstrates how much oil permeates throughout our system, and we can't get away from it,” said Venegas, who founded Aleni Brands last year and is in the process of adding product lines. “Who would have thought that the price of a toy would have a direct relationship with oil?”
It's not just toys. Petrochemicals derived from oil and natural gas go into making more than 6,000 consumer products, according to the US Department of Energy.
Lebanon's president says contacts ongoing to extend ceasefire
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President Joseph Aoun's comments on Wednesday came a day before a second meeting is scheduled to take place in Washington between the Lebanese and Israeli ambassadors.
Aoun said in comments released by his office that preparations are ongoing for negotiations between Lebanon and Israel.
He said the aim of the future talks is to “fully” stop Israeli attacks, withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanon, release of Lebanese prisoners in Israel, deployment of Lebanese troops along the border and beginning the reconstruction process.
Aoun said the support to Lebanon that was promised by US President Donald Trump and other countries “provided us with an opportunity that we must not miss, as it may not come again”.
The latest Israel-Hezbollah war was halted by a 10-day ceasefire that went into effect Friday.
Iranian news agency suggests undersea cables vulnerable in Strait of Hormuz
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A semiofficial news agency close to Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard again raised the idea Wednesday that Gulf Arab states remained vulnerable to having their undersea data cables being cut in the Strait of Hormuz.
The report by the Tasnim news agency suggested that “simultaneous damage to several major cables — whether through accidents or deliberate action — could trigger severe outages across the Persian Gulf”.
Multiple cables run through the strait. Already, the region has faced outages after undersea cables were cut multiple times in the Red Sea. Yemen's Iranian-backed Houthi rebels had threatened cables in the past.
Iranians waited tensely overnight to learn if ceasefire would continue
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With uncertainty over whether the ceasefire lasts, residents of Tehran say they are anxious about what comes next.
“Last night my family all stayed awake, waiting for the clock to show 3:30 a.m. and see who really has the upper hand,” said Reza Tehrani, a 34-year-old resident of Tehran.
Tehrani said Trump is making a series of false claims, including that Iran will give up its enriched uranium. “It's obvious that he will eventually take his warships back and nothing will happen. We will win, rest assured,” he said.
One resident voiced frustration with the uncertainty.
“We should know where we stand. Is it going to be a ceasefire, peace or the war is going to continue?” said Tehran resident Mashallah Mohammad Sadegh, 59. “The way things currently are, one doesn't know what to do.”
EU energy chief warns war could hit prices for years to come
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The European Union's top energy official is warning that the massive energy crisis sparked by the US-Israeli war on Iran is set to hit prices for months, even years, to come.
EU Energy Commissioner Dan Jorgensen said Wednesday that “this is not a short-term, small increase in prices. This is a crisis that is probably as serious as the 1973 and the 2022 crises combined.”
Jorgensen says the war is costing Europe around 500 million euros (USD 600 million) each day and that “we are looking into some very difficult months, or maybe even years” ahead. “Even in a best-case scenario, it's still bad,” he told reporters.
Iran acknowledges ceasefire extension
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Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei acknowledged the ceasefire extension in comments reported Wednesday by Iranian state television.
Baghaei did not specifically say Tehran was ready to attend a new round of talks with the United States in Islamabad.
“Diplomacy is a tool for securing national interests and security, and whenever we reach the conclusion that the necessary and reasonable conditions exist to use this tool to achieve national interests and to consolidate the achievements of the Iranian nation in thwarting the enemies' malicious objectives, we will take action,” he reportedly said. (AP) PY
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