Strait of Hormuz will be “open very soon” and US and Iran would jointly control it: Trump

President Donald Trump told CNN Monday that the Strait of Hormuz will be “open very soon,” adding he’d like to see the vital shipping route under joint US and Iranian control.

Pressed by CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on when to expect the strait reopened, Trump said, “That’ll be open very soon,” if negotiations with Iran continue apace.

“It’ll be jointly controlled,” he added. “Me and the Ayatollah, whoever the Ayatollah is, whoever the next Ayatollah is.”

“And there’ll also be a very serious form of regime change,” Trump said, citing strikes in the early hours of the conflict that took out much of Iran’s senior leadership. “There’s automatically a regime change,” he said, before suggesting talks over the weekend showed promise to wind down the conflict.

“But we’re dealing with some people that I find to be very reasonable, very solid,” Trump told Collins. “The people within know who they are, they’re very respected, and maybe one of them will be exactly what we’re looking for.”

President Donald Trump also downplayed a move to ease sanctions on certain Iranian oil stockpiles, suggesting it’s intended to bolster supplies amid a worsening energy crisis and that it wouldn’t “have any difference” in the war.

“I just want to have as much oil in the system as possible,” Trump told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins when pressed on his previous criticism of former President Barack Obama for sending cash to Iran as part of his nuclear deal with the country.

Trump continued: “We don’t even know if Iran gets that money. Frankly, I think it’s very hard, very hard for them to get it.”

Lifting the sanctions will allow the regime to benefit financially, but Trump claimed any revenue from the oil that goes to Iran would be negligible.

“Any small amount of money that Iran gets won’t have any difference in this war. But I want to have the system be lubricated,” he said.

Source: CNN

- Agencies