Bahrain and Kuwait were targeted by Iran missile and drone attacks early Sunday morning in response to U.S. airstrikes that hit the Islamic Republic. Tehran cautioned a “complete halt” could come to negotiations to end the war if Washington continues its attacks.
The Kuwaiti military confirmed air defenses countered incoming Iranian hostile fire just after the CENTCOM-authorized strikes, as Breitbart News reported.
Kuwait, which hosts a major U.S. army base, said it had detected and intercepted two ballistic missiles and there were no reports of injuries or damage.
Bahrain’s Interior Ministry said the Iranian strikes damaged a residential building near the international airport and no one was killed. The ministry released photos of an eight-story building, with the top floor completely destroyed, filled with rubble and its windows blown out.
The U.S. military launched fresh strikes against 10 Iranian targets after Tehran allegedly ignored the ceasefire and launched a drone attack on a Panama-flagged oil tanker carrying more than two million barrels of crude oil.
Efforts to reopen the troubled Strait of Hormuz without Iran’s direct oversight sparked the crossfire now gripping the region and imperiled negotiations for a lasting ceasefire, AP reports.
Iran has long insisted it alone must govern the strait, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf that once carried a fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi reiterated the claim during a state visit to Iraq on Sunday, the AP report notes.
“Any interference in this matter, any attempt to establish new or separate arrangements from those currently being carried out by the Islamic Republic of Iran, will only lead to further complications, delay the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, and increase the level of tension, just as over the past two nights we witnessed incidents in the Strait of Hormuz that led to an increase in tension and confrontation,” he said in Baghdad.
Tehran’s top diplomat called on all parties to “adhere to the memorandum of understanding and not to allow this MoU to deviate from its course” after both sides traded attacks in recent days.
AP contributed to this report
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