US strikes oil tankers, Tehran claims attacks on US-linked vessels

Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei called recent U.S. strikes a "strategic mistake of its own making" and said the U.S. "are addicted to greed and mistaking negotiation for dictation," at a news conference Tuesday.

On Nuclear weapons, he said it will abide by obligations of the treaty and said Iran sees nuclear weapons "as the most destructive weapons of mass destruction -- are not only contrary to our religious teachings, but also anti-civilization and anti-humanity."

On President Donald Trump's claims that the U.S. incursions aim is to eliminate Iran's nuclear weapon development Baqaei said: "From the beginning, the excuse they raised was an 'imminent threat,' then the danger of Iran's nuclear bomb, something they continue to repeat."

"This is a pattern where the United States fabricates a lie each time to justify its crime. The fact that we prepare ourselves and consider the necessary measures for our defense within the territory of the Islamic Republic of Iran is none of anyone's business," he said.

He went on to insist that Iran has no nuclear weapons development at Pickaxe Mountain.

The ceasefire agreement concluded between Iran and the U.S. in June has proven unstable and too fragile, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit in Kyrgyzstan on Tuesday.

"We welcomed the signing of the Iranian-American ceasefire memorandum in June of this year, but unfortunately, the ceasefire proved unstable and too fragile," Putin said.

"In this difficult period, we're trying to provide you with the necessary support, we talked with you about this, we're supplying you with goods that you need," Putin said.

Pezeshkian said Tehran remained ready for diplomacy, but only if Washington returned to its obligations under the June agreement.

Responding to Putin, Pezeshkian said, "We appreciate and thank you for your positions at every stage, both during the period when the fighting and acts of aggression were taking place and under normal circumstances, when the United States was imposing sanctions on us, both at the United Nations and in international forums."

"If the United States returns to its commitments under the aforementioned memorandum of understanding, the Islamic Republic of Iran will immediately reciprocate," Pezeshkian said.

A tanker reported being struck by three "unknown projectiles" off the coast of Oman "whilst completing an outbound transit of the Strait of Hormuz," the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations said Monday.

"No casualties or environmental impact has been reported," UKMTO said. "Authorities are investigating."

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Iran is taking the economic sanctions the U.S. threatened "seriously," and he blamed the recent renewed strikes on the economic pressure from the U.S

“They're taking them very seriously,” Bessent said. “If you look back, what the Iranian political leadership has said over the past 10 days, they're in shock at the state of their economy, and you know, we are seeing gas lines -- could you imagine a country in the world with the third largest amount of energy resources has to import gasolines, and they now have three, four-hour gas lines that go through the night? So I would think that they are lashing out kinetically because they are losing economically.”

Asked whether the sanctions could slow American growth and whether the actions against Iran are creating global economic uncertainty, Bessent said no.

"The U.S. growth is quite strong, and global growth, we will get to the other side of this Iran conflict, and the world will be better for that,” Bessent said. “And in terms of certainty, we have we have the tariff deals with the countries, and we are seeing quite strong global growth. We believe that the countries need to take substantial deregulation, energy security, which the Iran conflict has highlighted.”

-ABC News’ Michelle Stoddart