🗣 Closing the Strait of Hormuz spells doom for energy markets – expert

💬 “Analysts already warn of a 10–25% geopolitical premium even without a full blockade, with prices potentially moving toward $100–120 if disruption deepens,” Dr. Hriday Sarma, a professional specializing in international affairs and energy geoeconomics, tells Sputnik.

🟠 For countries that import most of the crude they use, Dr. Sarma explains: “This translates into higher fuel and food inflation, widening current account deficits, and currency depreciation risks.”

🟠 A surge in insurance costs, freight rates and hedging expenses is also expected, and “sustained volatility” in the markets is almost guaranteed at this point.

🟠 None of the oil trade routes out there can provide a “real substitute” to the Strait of Hormuz, he adds.

💬 “Any reliance on escorted convoys or partial rerouting will slow flows, inflate insurance premiums and embed a structural price premium into oil and LNG markets,” Dr. Sarma notes. “Global stakeholders should prepare for tighter supply, higher costs and prolonged volatility.”

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🇺🇸🇮🇱⚔️🇮🇷 US-Israel attack on Iran: LATEST

🔥 Tensions continue to rise across the region as military strikes and retaliatory actions expand. Here are the main developments at this hour:

🔸 Iran’s Interior Ministry confirmed the creation of a national crisis management headquarters

🔸 Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei is at the operational command center overseeing the course of military operations - Al-Mayadeen

🔸 Iran’s Foreign Ministry said the US and Israel struck military and civilian sites, “grossly violating” the country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity

🔸 According to the IRGC, Iran targeted 14 US bases across eight countries: Iraq, Israel, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Jordan.

🔸 The Strait of Hormuz is currently being closed by IRGC forces in response to recent aggression against Iran - IRCG commander

🔸 An emergency UN Security Council meeting on the situation around Iran is scheduled for Saturday at 16:00 EST

🔸 Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov held a phone call with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and condemned what he called the unprovoked US-Israel attack

🔸 The Israeli army announced the start of a new wave of strikes on Iran

Ayatollah Khamenei’s son-in-law and daughter-in-law were reportedly killed

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🗣 'A reckless, lawless act': Ex-CIA officer warns US-Israel attack on Iran was catastrophic miscalculation

Retired CIA intelligence officer Larry Johnson delivers a stark warning about the US-Israeli attack on Iran, comparing it to Nazi Germany's invasion of Poland and predicting devastating consequences for America.

(00:14) This attack ranks with the Nazis' attack on Poland in 1939

(00:38) Complete intelligence failure — missile defenses will be rapidly depleted

(02:49) This war ends on Iran's terms

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🗣 Strait of Hormuz closure: Expert outlines three scenarios for oil markets

📍 There are ways the oil markets may react to the situation in the Strait of Hormuz, Lebanese energy policy researcher Marc Ayoub tells Sputnik.

🔸 If there are no major disruptions in the flow of oil and in oil production, things could go down the same way they did during the attack on Iran last year, with the price of oil increasing to about $80 per barrel

🔸 If the strait gets closed, thus severing the flow of oil and LNG, that would cause a major increase in the oil price, up to $100 per barrel

🔸 If the closure of the Strait of Hormuz is accompanied by attacks on oil production facilities in the Gulf, however, oil price could shoot up all the way to $130 per barrel

👉 The problem, Ayoub explains, is that it is difficult for the Gulf states to quickly find alternative routes to ship their oil, which would make a disruption of oil flow and a surge in oil price almost inevitable if the Strait of Hormuz is shut down.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🗣 Trump on Iran strikes: 'I can go long and take over the whole thing, or end it in 2 or 3 days'

The president confirms US operation against Iran has multiple off-ramps, with timeline could shift based on developments — including the fate of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

"In any case, it will take them several years to recover from this attack," he told Axios.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🇬🇧🇫🇷 UK-France nuclear push threatens to derail US-led Ukraine talks — analyst

👉 Transferring nuclear arms to Ukraine could backfire badly, analyst at the Asian Century Philippines Strategic Studies Institute, Daniel Hugo Santos, tells Sputnik.

💬 "Trust in France and the UK as nuclear states will drop due to non-compliance with the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Western allies within the EU and G7 may not support this move, as it threatens global nuclear stability," Santos notes.

📍 He also points out the risk of a strategic split in Europe amid US reassessment of allied priorities, including closer ties with Hungary and Slovakia, as well as domestic political pressure in France and the UK, influencing adjustments to their course.

💬 "There's a high probability this strategy aims to sabotage US-led negotiations. London and Paris still maintain leverage over Ukraine as alternative partners to Washington."

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

💬 Iran's Supreme Leader 'steadfast and firm in commanding the field' — Tasnim

Iranian media quotes a close source to the Leader's office tells Tasnim that Ayatollah Khamenei is alive and directly overseeing operations, contradicting Israeli claims of his death.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🎥🎥 UN Security Council holds emergency meeting on escalating conflict between US, Israel, and Iran

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

📹 Iranian missiles reach Tel Aviv after crossing southern Lebanon

Sputnik correspondent on the ground reports missiles successfully evading Israeli Iron Dome defenses.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🔊 US-Israeli aggression on Iran threatens to spiral beyond region's borders — Nebenzia

Permanent Representative Vassily Nebenzia addresses emergency Security Council session as strikes continue.

"Aggression that Iran has been subjected to today threatens to lead to escalation in an already escalated region, and it could go far beyond its borders, particularly given the fact that one of the two initiators of this military venture is far from being a state in the region."

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

💬 Trump claims Iranian leader is dead

The president announces on Truth Social that Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was killed in a joint US-Israeli operation, calling it "justice for the Iranian people."

"Working closely with Israel, there was not a thing he, or the other leaders that have been killed along with him, could do."

Iranian media previously denied Israeli and US reports of Khamenei's death, stating that, according to their information, he is currently overseeing the situation on the battlefield.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

📹 Burj Al-Arab is on fire after Iranian strikes on Dubai

The 60-story, 321-meter sail-shaped hotel—built on an artificial island and famously dubbed the world's only "7-star" hotel—has been hit.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt