Iran threatens to start hitting Gulf power plants, mine waters

Dubai, Uae, Mar. 24: Iran warned Monday it will strike electrical plants across the Middle East if U.S. President Donald Trump follows through on his threat to bomb power stations in the Islamic Republic, and threatened to mine the "entire Persian Gulf" if invaded.

Tehran's threat puts at risk both electrical supplies and water in the Gulf Arab states, particularly as the desert nations commingle their power stations with desalination plants crucial for supplying drinking water.

Following the threat, Iran's semi-official Fars news agency published a list of such facilities, including the United Arab Emirates' nuclear power plant. Over the weekend, Iran launched missiles targeting Dimona in Israel, near a facility key to its long-suspected atomic weapons program. The Israeli facility wasn't damaged in the barrage.

Israel launched new attacks Monday on the Iranian capital, saying it had "begun a wide-scale wave of strikes" on infrastructure targets in Tehran without immediately elaborating.

As concerns grow in Tehran about the potential arrival of U.S. Marines in the region, Iran's Defense Council warned against the idea of an invasion.

"Any attempt by the enemy to target Iran's coasts or islands will, naturally and in accordance with established military practice, lead to the mining of all access routes ... in the Persian Gulf and along the coasts," it said in a statement.

The U.S. has been trying to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf, to energy shipments. Iran has shut the strait, through which a fifth of the world's oil is shipped along with other important commodities, in response to U.S. and Israeli strikes. A trickle of ships has been getting through the strait and Iran insists it remains open — just not to the U.S., Israel or their allies. The Marines could come ashore to seize either islands or territory in Iran to support that mission. Israel also has suggested its ground forces could take part in the war.

Tehran's signal is part of a back and forth series of threats that escalated this weekend with Trump saying in a social media post that if Tehran didn't open the strategic waterway to all ships, the United States would "obliterate" Iran's power plants. He gave Tehran a 48-hour deadline that expires late Monday, Washington time, further raising the stakes of the ongoing war with Iran that has already disrupted global energy supplies, sending natural gas and gasoline prices soaring.

Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard said Monday that if the U.S. did that, Iran would respond by hitting power plants in all areas that supply electricity to American bases, "as well as the economic, industrial and energy infrastructures in which Americans have shares."

"Do not doubt that we will do this," the Guard said in a statement read on Iranian state television.

The Fars news agency, which is close to the Revolutionary Guard, published a list of such sites in what appeared to be a veiled threat, including desalination plants as well as the UAE's Barakah nuclear power plant, which has four reactors out in the western deserts of the country near its border with Saudi Arabia. The judiciary's Mizan news agency also published the list.

Iranian parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf said Iran would consider vital infrastructure across the region to be legitimate targets, including energy and desalination facilities critical for drinking water in Gulf nations.

Oil prices remained stubbornly high in early trading, with the price of Brent crude, the international standard, at around $112 a barrel, up nearly 55% since Israel and the U.S. started the war on Feb. 28 by attacking Iran.

"No country will be immune to the effects of this crisis if it continues to go in this direction," said Fatih Birol, the head of the Paris-based International Energy Agency.

He told Australia's National Press Club in Canberra on Monday that the crisis in the Middle East has had a worse impact on energy markets than the two oil shocks of the 1970s and the Russia-Ukraine war combined.

Jorge Moreira da Silva, a senior United Nations official, said the world has already seen a ripple effect, including "exponential price hikes in oil, fuel and gas," having a far-reaching impact on millions, primarily in Asian and African developing countries.

"There is no military solution," he said. The war has also caused wild fluctuations in global stock markets as traders grow increasingly concerned about a world energy crisis and other issues.

United States Central Command chief Adm. Brad Cooper claimed in an interview that Iran was launching missiles and drones from populated areas, and suggested those areas would be targeted.

"You need to stay inside for right now," Cooper told Iranian civilians in the interview with the Farsi-language satellite network Iran International which aired early Monday.

"There will be a clear signal at some point, as the president has indicated, for you to be able to come out."

In his first one-on-one interview since the war started, Adm. Cooper said the campaign against Iran is "ahead or on plan" and that the U.S. and Israel were targeting infrastructure and manufacturing facilities to destroy Iran's capabilities to rebuild its military.

"It's not just about the threat today," he said. "We're eliminating the threat of the future, both in terms of the drones, the missiles as well as the navy."(AP)