Iran reviews deal, but U.S. patience is running low

Iran is reviewing a proposed agreement with the U.S. to halt their war, Iranian media reported on Tuesday, after U.S. President Donald Trump said talks to reach a deal were continuing.  

More than three months after the U.S. and Israel launched strikes against Iran, the conflict has hardened into a stalemate while efforts to negotiate an interim deal have proved inconclusive, leaving the Strait of Hormuz largely shut.  

Iran has not yet responded to a proposed final text of the temporary deal, and was taking a "stern" approach given what it sees as a history of U.S. non-compliance and longstanding mistrust, Mehr News Agency cited a source as saying.  

Trump said on Monday that negotiations with Iran were continuing and there would be a deal over the next week to extend a ceasefire agreed in early April and reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

Since mid-March, Trump has repeatedly said he is close to signing a peace agreement, though any such deal would postpone thorny issues including the future of Iran's nuclear programme. A ceasefire has largely held since early April, but Iran and the U.S. have exchanged strikes several times over the past week.

As part of any deal, Tehran is seeking an end to hostilities across all fronts including Lebanon, access to billions of dollars in oil revenues, waivers on crude exports, a lifting of a U.S. blockade on its ports, and continued leverage over the Strait of Hormuz.

Trump is under pressure to reopen the strait and curb U.S. fuel prices while not making concessions to Iran.  

Iran's elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said on Tuesday that 24 vessels had transited the strait in the past 24 hours, after obtaining permission from the Guard's navy.  

Iran threatened on Monday to expand its blockade to the Bab El Mandeb Strait, another chokepoint at the mouth of the Red Sea, if Israel resumed strikes on Beirut.

Highlighting the risk at sea, the world's largest shipping group MSC said on Tuesday that one of its vessels was struck by two projectiles while in Iraq's Umm Qasr port the previous day.

Iran's Revolutionary Guards claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it was carried out in retaliation for a U.S. attack on an Iranian vessel in the Gulf of Oman.