New attacks in the Middle East on Friday threatened to unravel an already fragile US-Iran ceasefire.<\/p>\n
Weeks of complex talks marked by threats and flare-ups of violence have failed to secure a deal to end the war and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a key conduit for global energy flows.<\/p>\n
A ceasefire in the Middle East war, triggered nearly 100 days ago by US and Israeli strikes that wiped out Iran\u2019s top leadership, has been in place since April 8.<\/p>\n
But tensions surged again on Friday when the US military said it struck radar sites in Iran after downing drones headed toward the strait.<\/p>\n
Shortly after, air raid sirens sounded in neighboring Gulf nations Kuwait and Bahrain \u2014 both US allies \u2014 and AFP correspondents in both countries heard explosions.<\/p>\n
Iran\u2019s Revolutionary Guards said early on Saturday they had targeted \u201cenemy bases in the area\u201d with missiles in response to a US \u201cinvasion\u201d of the country\u2019s Sirik and Qeshm islands.<\/p>\n
US Central Command (Centcom) said Iran launched seven ballistic missiles toward Kuwait and Bahrain.<\/p>\n
Centcom said six of the missiles were downed while the seventh \u201cdid not reach its intended target\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are currently no reports of harm to US personnel, and Iranian claims of damaging US 5th fleet headquarters in Bahrain are false,\u201d the command said in a statement.<\/p>\n
The latest flare-up came despite the United States moving ahead with allowing Iran\u2019s national football team to travel to the FIFA World Cup it is co-hosting with Canada and Mexico.<\/p>\n
US Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack confirmed the visa issuances, saying that \u201csports transcends borders, and we look forward to welcoming competitors and fans from around the world\u201d.<\/p>\n
However, Iran\u2019s Fars news agency reported that visas had yet to be issued for some members of the team\u2019s \u201ctechnical and executive staff\u201d.<\/p>\n
An unnamed US administration official said in a statement: \u201cWe will not allow the Iranian team to abuse this system to sneak terrorists into the United States under false pretenses.\u201d<\/p>\n
The team is due to fly from Turkey to Spain on Saturday before traveling on to their base camp in Mexico, where they will arrive on Sunday.<\/p>\n
Trading strikes
\nEarlier Friday, Centcom said its forces also downed four Iranian drones headed toward the Strait of Hormuz before striking Iranian coastal radar installations in Goruk and on Qeshm Island.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe attack drones posed an immediate threat to regional maritime traffic,\u201d while the strikes on radar installations \u201cdefend against further attacks,\u201d it said in a statement.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
New attacks in the Middle East on Friday threatened to unravel an already fragile US-Iran ceasefire. Weeks of complex talks marked by threats and flare-ups of violence have failed to secure a deal to end the war and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a key conduit for global energy flows. A ceasefire in the Middle […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18429,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18428","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18428","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18428"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18428\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18430,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18428\/revisions\/18430"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18429"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}