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UNITED NATIONS: Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said in a speech at the UN on Wednesday that Tehran would \u200bnever surrender to the US but still believes in diplomacy, a day after President Donald Trump used the same forum to threaten to \u201cannihilate\u201d Iran.<\/strong><\/p>\n The duelling speeches at the \u200cannual UN General Assembly in New York bookended the first shuttle talks between the United States and Iran for months, which appeared to have yielded no concessions in the public stance of either side towards ending the Middle East war.<\/span><\/p>\n In his speech, Pezeshkian defended Iran\u2019s military actions as defensive, and insisted Iran was not seeking nuclear weapons.<\/span><\/p>\n In a potential new flashpoint, Iran also threatened to act against its neighbours if they abide by new US sanctions intended to ground Iranian civilian \u200baircraft worldwide.<\/span><\/p>\n Washington has said it will impose so-called secondary sanctions against any country that allows Iranian flights after Wednesday. Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of Iran\u2019s Supreme National Security Council, told state TV \u200bIran would ensure neighbouring countries\u2019 airports could not function if they stop Iranian flights.<\/span><\/p>\n The annual UN gathering in New York provided the occasion on Tuesday \u2060for Iranian and U.S. officials to hold their first known indirect talks since a ceasefire collapsed in July, with Iran\u2019s Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi and US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner communicating through \u200bmediators on the sidelines.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cSteve and Jared had a very productive meeting today with mediators of Iran,\u201d Trump said on Tuesday after his own speech. \u201cI think there\u2019s a lot of momentum for them to make a \u200bdeal. It\u2019s what we\u2019re hearing from everybody.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei said Tehran had engaged with Washington through a Qatari mediator and conveyed conditions, including an end to the war on all fronts and a halt to US \u201cacts of aggression\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n Some Iranian state media initially reported that Araqchi and Witkoff had met, but Iranian officials clarified to Reuters that it was not face-to-face.<\/span><\/p>\n The diplomatic contact in New York caused a backlash in Iranian media associated \u200bwith hardliners.<\/span><\/p>\n An opinion piece run by the semi-official Tasnim news agency, associated with the Revolutionary Guards, said Araqchi was wrong to have contacts with Witkoff and Kushner, \u201ca major gift to Trump\u201d, as Iran had \u200balready conveyed its terms.<\/span><\/p>\n Iranian sources told Reuters the delegation had been ordered not to meet the Americans face-to-face by the Supreme National Security Council, a body that includes figures selected by Ayatollah Syed Mojtaba Khamenei, the supreme leader. \u200cKhamenei has yet \u2060to appear in public since replacing his father, who was killed on the war\u2019s first day.<\/span><\/p>\n Still, the diplomatic opening helped keep oil prices near two-week lows. Brent crude hovered around $100 a barrel after surging earlier this month when Yemen\u2019s Iran-backed Houthis launched a major offensive, threatening traffic through the Red Sea, an alternative Saudi export route.<\/span><\/p>\n The war, launched by Trump in February alongside Israel as \u201cOperation Epic Fury\u201d, has lasted nearly seven months, \u200bkilling thousands of people, disrupting global energy supplies \u200band spreading to other countries in the region \u2014 \u2060particularly to Lebanon and more recently to Yemen.<\/span><\/p>\n An interim agreement reached in June, signed by Trump and Pezeshkian, would have given Iran its main demands: lifting financial sanctions and unfreezing assets in return for talks on limiting its nuclear programme.<\/span><\/p>\n But that deal unravelled within weeks over shipping rules in the Strait of \u200bHormuz, conduit for a fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas before the war. Iran wants to exert control and collect fees from \u200bships that use it, which \u2060Washington rejects.<\/span><\/p>\n In the latest reported attack in the strait, Britain\u2019s UKMTO maritime security agency said a cargo ship had been hit by projectiles, causing two casualties among the crew. The crew had been evacuated and the ship was on fire and adrift.<\/span><\/p>\n Despite near-daily attacks, traffic through the strait has picked up in recent weeks. Oil producers pay shipping companies fees of as much as a quarter of a cargo\u2019s value to take the wartime \u2060risk of sailing \u200bthrough the strait with transponders switched off, before transferring crude to other vessels on the far side.<\/span><\/p>\n Exports from the United Arab \u200bEmirates have already recovered to pre-war levels, and Saudi Arabia has sold 60 million barrels of Gulf oil for both this month and next, to be delivered beyond the strait off the coast of Oman.<\/span><\/p>\nIRAN HARDLINERS RESIST DIPLOMATIC MOVES<\/span><\/h2>\n
OIL PRICES HOLD NEAR TWO-WEEK LOW<\/span><\/h2>\n