US strikes Iranian drone command sites
|
The US says it has struck Iranian military sites while Tehran says it has targeted a US base in response, the latest in a series of exchanges amid negotiations to end the three-month-war.
The strikes on Iran’s Gulf coast were in response to “aggressive Iranian actions that included the shootdown of a US MQ-1 drone that was operating over international waters”, the US Central Command said in a post on X.
“US fighter aircraft swiftly responded by eliminating Iranian air defences, a ground control station, and two one-way attack drones that posed clear threats to ships transiting regional waters,” CENTCOM said, adding it would continue to protect US assets and interests during the ongoing ceasefire.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said on Monday it had targeted an air base used by the US for an attack on southern Iran, without identifying which base.
Air defences in Kuwait, where a major US base is located, were intercepting missile and drone attacks on Monday as sirens sounded across the country, the state news agency KUNA reported, without providing further details.
The duelling attacks reflect the fragility of a weeks-long ceasefire in the Iran war, which has seen repeated attacks even as American and Iranian officials try to negotiate a deal to extend it
The US and Iran have sporadically exchanged strikes since their ceasefire took effect in early April as negotiations aimed at a more durable agreement drag on.
A similar exchange occurred on Thursday and was described in similar terms by both sides.
The war launched by the US and Israel on February 28 has killed thousands of people, mainly in Iran and Lebanon, and caused global economic pain by pushing up energy prices due to Iran’s effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
US President Donald Trump has said his key aim in the war is to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon with its highly enriched uranium. Tehran has consistently denied it has plans to do that.
Trump is under pressure to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and get US gasoline prices down ahead of the November congressional elections, as voters show increasing frustration over rising prices.
At the same time, he faces a potential backlash from Iran hawks in his own party over any concessions to Tehran.
The two sides remain at odds on several other issues, such as Tehran’s demands for the lifting of sanctions and the release of tens of billions of dollars of Iranian oil revenues frozen in foreign banks.
Israel’s war in Lebanon with the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militia is another major impediment.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday he had ordered troops to move further into Lebanon in the battle against the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke with both Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Netanyahu on the diplomatic negotiations between Israel and Lebanon and has proposed a plan to allow for “gradual de-escalation”, a US official said.
Reuters