Trump ‘not satisfied’ with Iran’s latest proposal to end war with US

US President Donald Trump has said he is “not satisfied” with Iran’s latest proposal in negotiations to end the war between the countries, rejecting the plan almost as soon as it was delivered.

Iran handed over its latest proposal for negotiations to mediators in Pakistan on Thursday night, Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency reported.

“They want to make a deal, I’m not satisfied with it, so we’ll see what happens,” Mr Trump told reporters on Friday at the White House.

While the ceasefire has largely halted fighting in Iran, the US and Iran are locked in a stand-off over the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world’s traded oil and gas passes in peacetime.

A US navy blockade stopping Iran’s tankers from getting out to sea has Iran’s economy reeling. The world economy is also under pressure as Iran maintains its chokehold on the strait.

Negotiations have continued by phone after Mr Trump called off his envoys’ trip to Pakistan last week, the president said.

Mr Trump this week floated a new plan to reopen the critical passageway used by America’s Gulf allies to export their oil and gas.

On Friday, Mr Trump expressed frustration with Iran’s leadership, describing it as fractured.

Discussing a briefing he had on Thursday with Admiral Brad Cooper, head of US Central Command, the president said the US has just two options in Iran.

“I mean, do we want to go and just blast the hell out of them and finish them forever? Or do we want to try and make a deal? I mean, those are the options,” Mr Trump said.

Mr Trump said he believes Iran’s leadership has made some progress towards unifying around a resolution.

“They’ve made strides, but I’m not sure if they ever get there,” he said. “There’s tremendous discord, they’re having a tremendous problem getting along with each other in Iran.”

Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, held a flurry of calls on Friday with many of his regional counterparts, including from Turkey, Egypt, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Azerbaijan, to brief them on his country’s latest initiatives to end the war, according to his social media.

European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas also spoke over the phone on Friday with Mr Araghchi. They discussed ongoing diplomatic efforts to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and long-term security arrangements, Ms Kallas’ office said in a statement. Ms Kallas also has been in contact with the EU’s Gulf partners.

Meanwhile, Iran’s imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi has been urgently transferred from prison to a hospital in north-western Iran after a “catastrophic deterioration” of her health, her foundation said on Friday.

The Narges Mohammadi Foundation said the Nobel Prize laureate had two episodes of complete loss of consciousness and a severe cardiac crisis. She was believed to have suffered a heart attack in late March, according to her lawyers who visited her a few days after the incident.

The hospital transfer comes “after 140 days of systematic medical neglect”, since her arrest on December 12, the foundation said.

Earlier this week, Mr Trump told Axios that he had rejected Iran’s proposal to reopen the strait in exchange for the US navy lifting its blockade of Iranian ports.

The Iranian proposal would have pushed negotiations on the country’s nuclear programme to a later date, two regional officials said earlier this week.

An explosion of leftover bombs from strikes during the war against Iran killed 14 members of the Revolutionary Guard, IRNA and other Iranian media reported on Friday.

A report by the Nournews website, believed to be close to Iran’s security, said the explosion happened near the northern city of Zanjan, which is north-west of Tehran.

It was the largest number of Revolutionary Guard members reported to be killed since the ceasefire began on April 7. The report said the ammunition included cluster bombs and air mines dropped during the fighting.

Since the war began on February 28, at least 3,375 people have been killed in Iran, and more than 2,600 people in Lebanon, where new fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah broke out two days after the war started, according to authorities.

Additionally, 24 people have died in Israel and more than 20 in Gulf Arab states. Seventeen Israeli soldiers in Lebanon and 13 US service members throughout the region have been killed.