Iran seeks deal with US after Donald Trump strikes Larak Island and Tehran retaliates against bases

Iran is still seeking a negotiated solution to its conflict with the US, President Masoud Pezeshkian says a day after the two countries resumed hostilities for the first time since late July, driving oil prices up more than 3.5 per cent.

Pezeshkian’s comments also came after US President Donald Trump posted an AI-generated video clip of Iran’s oil hub Kharg Island being destroyed.

There was no evidence of any such attack and a US official said on Monday the military had not targeted Kharg Island in overnight strikes.

An Iranian official dismissed Mr Trump’s post as “laughable”.

US forces on Sunday struck two Iranian launchers on Iran’s Larak Island, 660km east of Kharg, a US official said, prompting Iran to strike two US bases in Jordan, according to Iranian media.

Two people were killed and others were injured in the attack on Larak Island, Iran’s IRNA news agency quoted the local governor as saying on Monday.

A senior Iranian source, speaking to Reuters, described the overnight hostilities between the United States and Iran as a “limited and contained confrontation” but added that Iran would deliver a harsh response if attacked again.

Mr Trump said US air defences had shot down all Iranian missiles that could have caused any damage and said that tough new US economic sanctions on Iran were having a big effect, Fox News reported.

Pezeshkian, speaking to India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the sidelines of a regional security meeting in Kyrgyzstan, accused the US of failing to fulfil its commitments under past agreements.”Nevertheless, we are still trying to achieve an agreement and understanding, and we believe that continuing the war is in no one’s interest, neither ours, nor the region’s, nor humanity’s,” Iranian news agency Tasnim quoted him as saying.

“We believe the solution to the existing issues is dialogue and co-operation and that every capacity must be used to prevent the spread of insecurity and conflict.”

Earlier, Mr Trump had annoyed Iran by posting on his Truth Social platform the AI-generated video clip with the message: “Kharg Island being blown to smithereens!!! President DJT.”

Mr Trump was sending a message to Iran with the post, US Vice President JD Vance said on Monday.

“The president likes to switch it up on social media a little bit. He would be the first to say he doesn’t make announcements about military actions on social media but I think that he’s sending a message to the Iranians,” Vance said when asked about Mr Trump’s post.

Attacking Kharg, which handled 90 per cent of Iran’s oil exports before the war launched by U.S. and Israeli attacks on February 28, would severely disrupt its energy trade and put huge pressure on its economy.

“Trump’s tweets are laughable and conditions in Kharg are calm and appropriate,” Hamid Bovard, chief executive of government-run National Iranian Oil Co, said on Monday.

A US official said forces had attacked the Iranian launchers on Larak Island on Sunday after “Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces were observed preparing to launch rockets with sea mines into the Strait of Hormuz”.

Larak is a small island in the strait near the strategic Iranian port of Bandar Abbas.

The Strait of Hormuz, which normally handles a fifth of global crude oil shipments, has been largely blocked since the start of the war.

In a statement, the US Central Command said it took “limited, precise” action against mine-laying forces of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards that posed an “imminent threat” in the strait.

It gave no details.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Reuters on Sunday new secondary sanctions were likely to be unveiled weekly in the effort to pressure Iran, with an initial focus on banks.

The European Union said on Monday it would continue to work with the US and others to maintain economic pressure on Iran.