Trump says US can hit 'one or two' Iran sites in minutes as Tehran floats two-day Hormuz plan

US President Donald Trump said on Saturday that the United States still had "one or two sites" in Iran to deal with and could strike them "in 10 minutes", even as Iran's foreign minister said mediators had narrowed a proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to a two-day implementation period.

"We've knocked out their nuclear. We still have to take care of, I would say one or two sites, but we can do that in 10 minutes," Trump told reporters at Mar-a-Lago in Florida on Saturday, US time, according to Reuters. He named Pickaxe Mountain, a site near Iran's Natanz nuclear complex, as one he had in mind. Asked about the talks, he said they were "going fine" but that Iran was "not very reliable".

What happened

Trump's remarks reached India early on Sunday morning. ANI, citing the Wall Street Journal, reported that he had spoken by phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hours earlier. Iran has denied carrying out nuclear work at Pickaxe Mountain, Gulf News reported.

On Saturday afternoon, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told Al Jazeera that Qatari mediators had proposed cutting the period Iran would need to reopen the strait to five days, and that talks had since brought it down further. "We have reached a proposal at this stage that reduces the implementation period to two days," he said. He did not say when the clock would start.

Araghchi set out what Iran wants in return, according to Al Jazeera and the news site Nukta: the lifting of sanctions imposed after what he called the Islamabad memorandum, a reduction of US forces in the region, the restoration of US waivers that allowed some countries to buy Iranian oil, the release of frozen Iranian funds, including money held in Qatar, and recognition of shipping routes discussed with Oman. Pakistani mediators are also involved, Nukta reported. Proposals on Iran's nuclear programme are being treated as a second phase.

The US has not publicly responded to the two-day proposal. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Saturday that Trump had not yet decided whether to order new strikes.

Shipping still under attack

The two sides are talking while ships in and around the strait keep getting hit. On 29 October a small boat attached two explosive devices to the Panama-flagged tanker Louise 1, which had 27 Indian seafarers aboard, about 25 nautical miles north-east of Khasab in Oman, according to a warning from the UK Maritime Trade Operations centre reported by gCaptain. The crew were safe and the ship resumed its voyage. On Saturday Iran's navy said another tanker had caught fire after striking mines east of the strait; that claim has not been independently confirmed, and the US Central Command has said the main transit routes are clear of mines.

Iranian officials have kept up their warnings. Ebrahim Azizi, who chairs the Iranian parliament's national security committee, said any attack would meet an "immediate and even harsher response", Gulf News reported.

Why it matters for India

Oil prices are the most direct link. Brent crude for January delivery settled at $113.43 a barrel on Friday, and Brent rose 13.6% over October, its fourth monthly gain in a row, Reuters reported. Markets were closed over the weekend, so Trump's remarks and the Iranian proposal will be priced in when trading resumes on Monday. Core OPEC+ members are due to meet online on Sunday; Reuters reported last week that they were expected to keep December output targets unchanged.

India's Ministry of External Affairs says 22 Indian nationals, 14 of them seafarers, have been killed in the West Asia conflict, ANI reported.

What happens next

The US votes in midterm elections on Tuesday, 3 November. Trump said on 8 October that the US would not attack Iran before the midterms, Axios reported. Whether the two-day plan is accepted, and in what sequence, is now the main question for shipping and for oil importers such as India.