Trump urges immediate halt to Iranian oil purchases, warns of sanctions
United States President Donald Trump stands in the presidential box as he tours the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, U.S. on March 17, 2025. (AFP Photo)
United States President Donald Trump on Thursday called for an immediate end to all purchases of Iranian oil and petrochemical products, warning that violators would face sweeping secondary sanctions.
“All purchases of Iranian Oil, or Petrochemical products, must stop, NOW!” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
He stated that “any country or person” engaging in such transactions would face secondary sanctions and be barred from doing business with the United States “in any way, shape, or form.”
The statement followed a State Department announcement Wednesday imposing sanctions on seven entities involved in Iranian oil trade. The agency said Trump remained committed to ending Iran’s “illicit exports,” including shipments to China, under his “maximum pressure” strategy.
The United States has accused Iran of backing the Yemeni Houthi group, which has targeted ships transiting the Red and Arabian seas, the Bab al-Mandab Strait and the Gulf of Aden since November 2023 in solidarity with Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
Trump’s remarks came days after the latest U.S.-Iran nuclear negotiations mediated by Oman.
US-Iran nuclear talks postponed
Meanwhile, U.S.-Iran nuclear talks scheduled for May 3 were postponed, Oman confirmed Thursday.
Omani Foreign Minister Badr Albusaidi confirmed the delay in a statement posted on X, saying: “For logistical reasons we are rescheduling the U.S.-Iran meeting provisionally planned for Saturday May 3rd.”
He added that “new dates will be announced when mutually agreed.”
Neither Washington nor Tehran has commented on the postponement. However, the delay comes amid heightened Iranian criticism of U.S. policy.
Iran calls sanctions as ‘hostile, unlawful’
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei on Thursday warned against what he described as “contradictory behavior and provocative statements” from the United States.
Baghaei condemned the recent U.S. sanctions on Tehran, calling them “hostile, unlawful, and inhumane against the Iranian people.”
Since April 12, Oman and Italy have hosted three rounds of indirect talks aimed at reviving or renegotiating a nuclear agreement between Washington and Tehran.
The postponed meeting would have marked the fourth high-level negotiation between the two countries since Trump withdrew from the 2015 nuclear accord in 2018. That agreement had eased international sanctions on Iran in exchange for limits on its nuclear program.
