U.S. President Donald Trump discussed the Iran war with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Thursday, as new attacks on ships near the Strait of Hormuz highlighted the growing costs of the prolonged standoff and stalled peace talks.
After Trump and Xi met, a White House official said the two leaders agreed that the strait should remain open and that Iran must never obtain nuclear weapons.
China is a close partner of Iran and the largest buyer of its oil exports.
In an interview with CNBC in Beijing, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he believed China “will do everything possible” to help reopen the strait, which he said is “very much in their interest.”
Diplomatic efforts to end the war have stalled since last week, when Iran and the United States each rejected the other’s latest proposals, sticking to earlier demands that both sides consider non-negotiable.
Iran has largely closed the Strait of Hormuz to ships from other countries since the United States and Israel launched the war two and a half months ago, causing the biggest disruption to global energy supplies in modern history.
In the latest incident affecting the trade route, an Indian cargo ship carrying livestock from Africa to the United Arab Emirates sank on Thursday in waters off the coast of Oman.
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