While awaiting President Donald Trump’s response to the US-Iran memorandum of understanding, an American official has downplayed the content of US intelligence reports that indicated the presence of mines in the Strait of Hormuz, writes ilfattoquotidiano.it.

This is a key issue for the transit of ships and the continuation of negotiations.

According to the source cited by the broadcaster, the US military has so far not found no Iranian mines during its searches.

However, in February, at the start of the joint US-Israeli military offensive against Tehran, intelligence claimed otherwise: Tehran had laid mines at several locations along the Strait.”

Trump also repeated the story on Social Truth, claiming that Iran had laid underwater mines in the Strait and that the United States had destroyed them.

However, it now appears that there is no evidence of the presence of mines and the military has not been able to verify these claims.

The search operation was carried out with aircraft, drones and underwater robots and did not yield results that confirmed the reports.

According to the NBC source, the military identified “several objects”, but none of them can currently be classified as mines. Even if they were, “the threat appears less serious than previously claimed

Retired former Israeli Navy Commander Eliezer Cheny Marom spoke about the Iranian blockade.

In a recent interview with the Jerusalem Post, he speculated that Iran only started laying mines in the Strait after it claimed it had.

The Iranians claimed they had laid mines in the Strait of Hormuz, but so far I have not seen any. Then they said the Americans had attacked ships that used to lay mines.

Meanwhile, the Revolutionary Guards announced that in the last 24 hours they have coordinated the passage of 20 ships through the Strait of Hormuz.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the Strait is not completely open, but thanks to measures taken by ship owners – some of them in cooperation with the US military – it is not completely closed either.

Source: prizrenpost