Ghalibaf says Iran will not surrender to the US
Iran's Ghalibaf says the country will stand up to the United States, according to Fars.
Published
The statement comes days after Iran told the Trump administration it would open the blocked Strait of Hormuz, with its economic difficulties deepening due to its inability to export crude oil. Iran had also said it would reopen the strait within seven days if the US lifted its blockade, a conditional offer reported by Kyodo. Iran's Revolutionary Guard had separately threatened a wider war if the US escalates, after a tanker in the strait was hit by an unknown projectile, as US and Iranian officials prepared for talks in New York. Trump said on Monday that Iran "is not doing well" and that he had meetings scheduled on the subject that day.
Ghalibaf's remarks sit alongside those offers rather than replacing them, and they undercut the diplomatic track Qatar is working on and the indirect negotiations apparently underway with Trump administration officials, making a negotiated settlement less likely near term. That tilts the risk balance toward continued confrontation, higher energy prices, and the inflation pressures Chicago Fed President Goolsbee has already flagged as a potential constraint on Fed policy.