Iran keeps US waiting for a response

A state of relative calm prevailed around the Strait of Hormuz, after days of sporadic flare-ups, as the United States waited for Iran’s response to its latest proposals to end more than two months of fighting and begin peace talks. US President Donald Trump had said on Friday that he was expecting Iran’s response to Washington’s latest proposal for a deal to extend a fragile truce and launch peace talks — “supposedly tonight”. But if Iran did send Pakistani mediators a response, there was no public sign of it, and Tehran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi called into question the reliability of the US leadership in a call with his Turkish counterpart. “The recent escalation of tensions by American forces in the Persian Gulf and their numerous actions in violating the ceasefire have added to suspicions about the motivation and seriousness of the American side in the path of diplomacy,” he said, according to an Iranian account of the call published by the ISNA news agency. In an incident on Friday, a US fighter jet fired on and disabled two Iranian-flagged tankers that Washington accused of challenging its naval blockade of Iran’s ports. An Iranian military official told local media the country’s navy had responded “to American terrorism with strikes” and that “the clashes have now ceased”. The latest incident came after a previous flare-up overnight Thursday to Friday in the Strait of Hormuz, a vital international sea lane that Iran i