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French President Emmanuel Macron issued a stern message to Donald Trump on Thursday, urging a more serious approach to the situation with Iran and dismissing calls for military intervention to reopen the Strait of Hormuz as unrealistic.
Macron critiqued the U.S. President’s recent inconsistent remarks on the conflict, advising Trump to consider speaking less frequently on the matter. The French leader emphasized that negotiations with Tehran are the only viable solution to ensure the free passage of a significant portion of the world’s oil supply through the Strait.
This comes in the wake of Trump’s first live address since the onset of the conflict, during which he urged European countries to take charge of securing the vital maritime corridor. Trump argued that NATO allies should spearhead efforts to reopen the shipping lane, suggesting they have a greater dependence on it than the United States does.
Meanwhile, UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper hosted an international summit attended by representatives from over 40 countries to discuss the issue, notably without American participation.
UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper on Thursday hosted an international summit of more than 40 nations on the issue – with America notably absent.
She hit out at Tehran for its strikes on 25 vessels that have trapped 20,000 crew on some 2,000 ships. Ms Cooper said Iranian ‘recklessness towards countries who were never involved in this conflict’ has hit ‘mortgage rates and petrol prices’ in the UK and endangered ‘our global economic security’.
She called on those present to mobilise the ‘full range of diplomatic and economic tools’ as well as finding ways of reassuring the shipping insurance market.
She later said measures could include ‘working with the International Maritime Organisation to ensure that the first stranded ships can get moving again’.
Emmanuel Macron told Donald Trump on Thursday to get ‘serious’ over Iran as he dismissed the demands to reopen the Strait of Hormuz by force as ‘unrealistic’
The French President also took aim at the US President’s recent wildly conflicting statements on the war, telling him: ‘Perhaps you shouldn’t talk every day’
In a statement after the virtual meeting, Ms Cooper said they had explored ‘co-ordinated economic and political measures, such as sanctions, to bear down on Iran if the Strait remains closed’.
In response to Mr Trump, she said: ‘Our job is to take decisions in the UK national interest.’
She added: ‘We’ve taken a different view from the US from early on and we didn’t get drawn into offensive action in the Middle East because we thought that there were real concerns about escalation risks, impact – including on the economy – and also the need for a proper plan.’
The summit followed wild statements from Mr Trump, who has veered between saying the US will open the Strait alone to demanding Europe clear it without help.
In his address on Wednesday, he said: ‘The countries of the world that do receive oil through the Hormuz Strait must take care of that passage.
‘They must cherish it. They must grab it and cherish it, they can do it easily. We will be helpful but they should take the lead in protecting the oil that they so desperately depend on.’
He added they must ‘build up some delayed courage’.
However, Mr Macron, on a visit to South Korea on Thursday, rebuffed the President’s latest call to arms for Western allies.
He said: ‘There are those who advocate for the liberation of the Strait of Hormuz by force through a military operation, a position sometimes expressed by the United States. I say sometimes because it has varied, it is never the option we have chosen and we consider it unrealistic.’
Mr Macron said such an operation would be exposed to ‘coastal threats’ from Iran’s Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) which possesses ‘significant resources as well as ballistic missiles’. Calling for a ceasefire and return to negotiations, the French President added: ‘This can only be done in concert with Iran.’
Taking aim at Mr Trump’s inconsistent messaging, he told the US leader: ‘You have to be serious.
‘When you want to be serious, you don’t say the opposite every day of what you said the day before. And perhaps you shouldn’t talk every day.’
It comes after Mr Trump threatened to pull out of Nato over what he sees as betrayal by the alliance over Iran. Mr Macron warned him that by creating ‘daily doubt about his commitment’ he will ‘hollow it out’. Iran is seizing on the economic fallout caused by its closure of the Strait by setting up a de-facto toll system open to friendly ships if they pay £1.5million.
Its foreign ministry spokesman said it is allowing ships to pass through as long as they ‘do not belong to the aggressor and are not related to them’.
Analysts will now consider how to make the Strait ‘accessible and safe’ after fighting is over. But that is not expected to involve Royal Navy warships to police the waterway.
Bridget Diakun, a senior risk and compliance analyst, said a small number of oil and gas tankers are now passing through after being granted safe passage through ‘diplomatic channels’.
She told the BBC: ‘From what we understand, the owners and operators of the ships are acting through intermediaries to contact Iranian authorities and the IRGC to get approval to go through the Strait.’
The money charged was said to be a ‘drop in the pool of money that you’re earning’ – roughly working out at one dollar per barrel.
As the world economy continues to suffer, Italy on Thursday called for a ‘humanitarian corridor’ to allow fertiliser and other essentials through and avoid a food disaster in Africa.