COPENHAGEN: Denmark and its allies deployed troops to Greenland in January, fearing a United States invasion as tensions spiked over President Donald Trump's bid to annex it, Danish broadcaster DR said on Thursday (Mar 19).

DR said it had seen a military operations order dated on Jan 13, which served as the basis for the deployment of Danish forces in the autonomous Danish territory.

The document described an operation organising the defence of Greenland, immediately after the US operation in Venezuela to oust President Nicolas Maduro.

"When Trump says all the time that he wants to buy Greenland, and then we see what happens in Venezuela - we had to take all possible scenarios seriously," a Danish military official speaking on condition of anonymity told DR.

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"The official machinery of the US is not working the way it used to," he added.

Under the cover of a NATO exercise dubbed "Arctic Endurance", a Danish regiment and elite forces were sent to Greenland, as well as French alpine troops and German and Swedish soldiers, DR said.

It was a real deployment and not an exercise, another source told DR.

"There was no possible ambiguity," he said. The troops were deployed with blood for transfusions and explosives, the source said to back up the claim that it was not an exercise.

Neither the Danish military nor its government, nor the Greenlandic government, have commented on the report.

Trump has repeatedly said he believes the US must control Greenland to ensure its national security, and has long refused to rule out the use of military force to get it.

Like the US, Denmark is a founding member of NATO.

After several intense weeks of aggressive remarks that plunged the alliance into its deepest crisis in years, Trump backed down from his threats on Jan 21, announcing that he had reached a "framework" agreement on Greenland with NATO's secretary general, the details of which remain vague.

In the weeks that followed, NATO launched its Arctic Sentry mission to beef up security in the region, in which Danish and US forces are participating, among others.

WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump told Israel not to repeat its attacks on Iranian natural gas infrastructure as tit-for-tat strikes on energy plants sent prices spiralling, sharply escalating the US-Israeli war on Iran.

The conflict has killed thousands of people, spread to neighbouring nations and hit the global economy since the United States and Israel launched strikes on Feb 28, after talks about Tehran's nuclear program failed to yield a deal.

Trump's comment came as energy prices jumped on Thursday (Mar 19) after Iran responded to an Israeli attack on a major gas field by hitting Qatar's Ras Laffan Industrial City, which processes around a fifth of the world's liquefied natural gas, causing damage that will take years to repair.

Saudi Arabia's main port on the Red Sea, where it has been able to divert some exports to avoid Iran's closure of the Gulf's exit point, the Strait of Hormuz, was also attacked.

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The strikes underscored Iran's continued ability to exact a heavy price for the US-Israeli campaign, and the limits of air defences in protecting the Gulf's most valuable and strategic energy assets.

Trump, politically vulnerable to rising fuel prices among his core voters ahead of November's midterm elections, has lashed out at allies who have responded cautiously to his demands that they help secure the Strait of Hormuz, the conduit for around a fifth of the world's oil.

But he said he had told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not to repeat the attack on energy infrastructure. "I told him, 'Don't do that', and he won't do that," he told reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday.

A US official and three other people familiar with the planning told Reuters that Trump was considering sending thousands more US troops to the Middle East.

But on Thursday, Trump said he had no plans to deploy ground forces. "I'm not putting troops anywhere," he said.

Netanyahu later on Thursday said that Israel acted alone in the bombing of Iran's South Pars gas field and confirmed that Trump asked Israel to hold off on such attacks.

Iran is being "decimated" and no longer has the capacity to enrich uranium or make ballistic missiles after 20 days of US-Israeli air attacks, but a revolution in the country would not come from the air and would require a "ground component," he said, without elaborating.

As the Israeli leader spoke, Iran launched a new wave of missiles toward his country, according to Israel's military and Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Israel's military said late on Thursday that the air force had carried out over 130 strikes on targets in western and central Iran over the past day, including ballistic missile launchers, drones and air defence systems.

Separately, authorities in the United Arab Emirates said they had dismantled a "terrorist network" funded and operated by Lebanon's Hezbollah and Iran.

ENERGY CRISIS ESCALATES

With no end in sight to the conflict, and the threat of a global "oil shock" growing by the day, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Japan issued a joint statement expressing "our readiness to contribute to appropriate efforts to ensure safe passage through the Strait".

They also promised "other steps to stabilise energy markets, including working with certain producing nations to increase output".

There was little indication of any immediate move. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz reiterated that any contribution to securing the strait would come only after hostilities ended.

The resistance by major US allies to becoming involved in the war reflects scepticism over a conflict European leaders have said has unclear objectives that they did not seek and over which they have little control.

Israel's bombing of Iran's South Pars gas field, which Trump said the US had not known about, suggested gaps in the coordination of strategy and war aims between the main protagonists.

Adding to the confusion around the attack, three Israeli officials said the operation had taken place in consultation with the United States, but was unlikely to be repeated.

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard told the House intelligence committee that US and Israeli goals differed: "... the Israeli government has been focused on disabling the Iranian leadership. The president has stated that his objectives are to destroy Iran's ballistic missile launching capability, their ballistic missile production capability, and their navy."

"A NEW STAGE IN THE WAR"

Iran's military said strikes on Iran's energy infrastructure had led to "a new stage in the war" in which it had attacked energy facilities linked to the United States.

"If strikes (on Iran's energy facilities) happen again, further attacks on your energy infrastructure and that of your allies will not stop until it is completely destroyed," Iranian military spokesman Ebrahim Zolfaqari said, according to state media.

QatarEnergy's CEO told Reuters the Iranian attacks had knocked out a sixth of Qatar's LNG export capacity, worth US$20 billion a year, and that repairs would take three to five years.

Israeli media reported that an Iranian strike hit oil facilities in Israel's port of Haifa, causing damage but no casualties.

WASHINGTON: The US may soon remove sanctions from Iranian oil that is stranded on tankers to help lift global supplies and reduce prices, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Thursday (Mar 19).

"In the coming days, we may unsanction the Iranian oil that's on the water. It's about 140 million barrels," Bessent told Fox Business Network's Mornings with Maria program.

"So, depending on how you count it, that's 10 days to two weeks of supply," he added.

Bessent said the addition of sanctioned Iranian oil into global supplies would help keep oil prices down for the next 10 to 14 days. Oil prices have been above US$100 per barrel for much of the past two weeks as Iran has closed the Strait of Hormuz to shipping and has attacked tankers.

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The Treasury recently took a similar step to temporarily allow the sale of sanctioned Russian oil stranded on tankers, which Bessent said added around 130 million barrels to global supplies.

A source familiar with the Treasury's planning said that if the Trump administration eases sanctions on Iranian oil, one option would be a waiver similar to one used for Russian oil, allowing sales of crude already stranded at sea and confined to a narrow time frame.

"A potential waiver could accelerate the diversion of oil already destined for China into global markets more broadly, helping ensure adequate supply and blunting Iran’s leverage over the Strait of Hormuz," said the source, who was not authorised to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Bessent said the US would take other actions to increase oil supply, including a unilateral release of stocks from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve above last week's coordinated joint G7 release of 400 million barrels.

He said the Treasury would "absolutely not" try to intervene in oil futures markets, but would take actions to increase physical supplies to try to make up for the 10 million to 14 million barrel-per-day deficit caused by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

"So, to be clear, we're not intervening in the financial markets. We are supplying the physical markets," Bessent said.

US President Donald Trump lauded Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi during a White House meeting on Thursday for "really stepping up to the plate" on Iran.

Japan joined leading European nations in saying it would take steps to stabilise energy markets and join "appropriate measures" to ensure safe passage for ships through the Strait of Hormuz.

Bessent told Fox Business that Japan's navy has some of the best minesweepers and mine-detection capabilities and that he believed Japan would release more of its large petroleum reserve to supply the strained oil market.

He said China had become an "unreliable" supplier of refined products, as it has stopped exporting jet fuel and other products to other countries in Asia.

SINGAPORE: Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s recent visits to China and India yielded a flurry of agreements, with some reports describing the trips as a “reset” in bilateral relations.

But these were more than routine diplomatic engagements. Beyond efforts to repair troubled relationships, they signalled a broader intent – to step out of the shadow of Canada’s giant southern neighbour, the United States.

US President Donald Trump’s upending of long-held assumptions of alliances, as well as claims to Canada and Greenland, has made Ottawa realise that it must engineer pragmatic new frameworks if it is to survive the disintegration of the world order.

In a now widely referenced speech delivered at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January, Mr Carney said the old world order was not coming back and urged middle powers to “act together because if we're not at the table, we're on the menu”.

LINGERING SUSPICIONS

The outcomes of Mr Carney’s trips to China and India reflected that urgency.

His visit to China in January concluded with 21 agreements in fields from clean energy to agriculture, alongside all the right noises about expanded people-to-people connections.

In India, the Canadian prime minister's visit earlier this month produced agreements on supply chains for clean energy, electric vehicles and advanced manufacturing. Both sides also agreed to accelerate progress on a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement to double bilateral trade.

But calling Canada’s new frameworks with China and India “resets” may somewhat overstate the case, because underlying tensions have not gone away.

In India’s case, vocal Khalistan separatist voices – which seek the creation of an independent Sikh homeland in northern India - in Canada remain an annoyance for New Delhi.

In Canada’s domestic political landscape, the Sikh vote is important, while advocating the Khalistan cause falls under protected speech in Canada. But Ottawa will need to ensure that this does not rise to the level of jeopardising a relationship which has assumed more importance in the larger context of Canadian foreign policy.

India must also not overreact to Khalistan separatist advocacy in Canada, although this will be difficult as the scar of the Khalistan insurgency in the 1980s – which spawned terrorism, bloody battles and the killing of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi – runs deep and suspicion remains.

Diplomatic relations plunged in 2023 after then-Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau accused Indian government agents of playing a role in the killing of Canadian Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia. This was strongly denied by India.

The issue remains unresolved, but both governments have decided to let it be, according to veteran Canadian journalist Terry Milewski who wrote the 2021 book “Blood for Blood: Fifty Years of the Global Khalistan Project”.

“They’re just going to have to go with the undecided… dispute in the background,” he told Indian news channel ANI in January.

In China’s case, the two countries will also need to put some issues behind them.

The 2018 detention of Huawei chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou in Canada, on a US request, infuriated Beijing. In what was widely seen as a tit-for-tat action, two Canadians were subsequently arrested in China under state secret laws. All three individuals returned to their home countries, but the episode strained the bilateral relationship.

Ties were further tested in 2024, when trade disputes saw both sides imposing tariffs on one another.

In the backdrop of a changing world, Mr Carney’s trip to China was not simply about stabilising relations, according to Ms Vina Nadjibulla, vice-president of research and strategy at the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada.

“It was about signalling, and beginning to implement, a more independent Canadian foreign policy in response to fundamental shifts in the global economic and security order - and a growing recognition that Canada can no longer rely on old assumptions about alliances, global rules, predictability, or insulation from geopolitical shock, including in its relationship with the United States,” she wrote in late January.

NO PLACE FOR NOSTALGIA

Since then, the fraying of the world order has only deepened, in the form of a war in Iran which has entered its third week and shows no clear end in sight. Amid that, Mr Trump continues to pursue his tariff policy with new trade probes targeting key trading partners – increasingly leaving middle powers like Canada to fend for themselves.

This kind of “middle power pragmatism” also applies to Southeast Asian countries, which know this game well, especially since the end of the Cold War.

India, which has been actively diversifying its trade partners, most notably by finalising what has been dubbed the “mother of all deals” with the European Union, is also learning that despite being a nuclear power, it is not – or at least not yet – the great power it aspires to be.

Veteran former Singapore diplomat Bilahari Kausikan sees Canada’s foreign policy shift as trying to put into practice Mr Carney’s Davos speech.

“But in reality, this is what India, Australia, Japan, South Korea had already been doing with each other and other powers, big, middle and small, for quite some time,” Mr Kausikan told me.

As Mr Carney said at Davos, there is no place for nostalgia. Canada now finds itself in the same boat as other middle powers, sailing rough seas. It is also in the interest of other middle powers, like India, to navigate underlying tensions diplomatically.

Nirmal Ghosh, a former foreign correspondent, is an author and independent writer based in Singapore. He writes a monthly column for CNA, published every third Friday.

SINGAPORE: China has no reason to help the US in the Strait of Hormuz - and every incentive to wait out this crisis.

Even US President Donald Trump’s request to delay a much-anticipated summit with his Chinese counterpart will work in Xi Jinping’s favour. It allows Beijing to better lay the groundwork on the issues it’s pressing Washington on, from limits on access to American technology and investment restrictions to relief from tariffs and a way to manage tensions over Taiwan. None of that was likely to be secured in a rushed encounter.

China reacted coolly to the White House’s decision to move the meeting by five or six weeks, as it did to Trump’s demands that Beijing and others help counter Iran’s blockade of Hormuz, a key chokepoint through which roughly 20 per cent of the world’s oil passes.

The US president’s heavy-handed approach - he has since abandoned those efforts and scolded allies who uniformly rejected his demand - will only give China further ammunition to argue to its partners in the Global South that Washington’s priorities can shift abruptly in moments of crisis, and not in their favour.

A SHORT DELAY

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Still, Xi will want nothing to get in the way of a successful summit. Leader-to-leader diplomacy is critical, notes Dylan Loh, an associate professor at the Singapore-based Nanyang Technological University. 

“The Chinese see Trump as the only one to make the decisions they need resolved,” he told me. “Beijing has given Trump quite a bit of face in this crisis, but also doesn’t want to be seen as pressured into doing what Trump wants in Hormuz.”

Xi can absorb a short delay. A longer, open-ended postponement would suggest the relationship is drifting and it would then be hard for even diplomacy at the highest level to stabilise it.
 

A similar logic applies to energy. A temporary disruption in the Strait of Hormuz is manageable. But a prolonged closure would raise global prices of everything from food to fertilisers. Ultimately, that would hurt China too, at a time when its economy is under strain.

Iran accounts for roughly 13 per cent of China’s seaborne crude imports, but the disruption to its supplies is not nearly as big a problem as it is for other countries, as the China Global South Project notes. Oil tracking data show that millions of barrels of Iranian crude have continued to flow - much of it to China now that Tehran is allowing some ships through.

Beijing has been working on a Plan B for a while. It has diversified its energy supplies, buying heavily from Russia despite Western sanctions, and building up a strategic reserve that will last several months, while investing aggressively in renewables.

PATIENCE IS THE BEST STRATEGY?

There is also no political scenario in which China could easily justify joining a US-led military coalition. Doing so would cut against decades of foreign policy built around non-interference. It would also undermine Beijing’s positioning as an alternative to Western interventionism - particularly in the Global South, where it has long cast itself as a counterweight to American hegemony.

Instead, Chinese policymakers are likely to assess that the best strategy right now lies in patience. An extended Middle East crisis could again divert US attention and resources away from the region, which is a shift that has historically worked to Beijing’s advantage.

The Iran conflict is forcing Washington to reportedly pull military resources and troops from the Indo-Pacific, which as I have written is causing alarm among allies and partners. Taiwan is the most vulnerable, and will take little comfort from a delay in the Trump-Xi summit. If and when the two leaders do meet, the US president may arrive still preoccupied with Iran, while Xi will come with the benefit of more time to consolidate his position - potentially allowing him to press for concessions that could weaken American support for the island.

Taiwan is already facing pressure from China over US weapons deliveries, at a time when the People’s Liberation Army has stepped up the pace of its sorties around the island.

None of this suggests Beijing welcomes instability. But from its perspective, there is little reason to rush - either into a risky military commitment in Hormuz or into a hastily arranged meeting with Trump. Time is on China’s side.

NEW YORK: Energy prices soared during a volatile session Thursday (Mar 19), while Wall Street stocks trimmed losses after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the war with Iran could finish sooner than expected.

Major Wall Street indices were headed to significant losses following gloomy sessions in Europe and Asia, but got a boost from Netanyahu's press conference shortly before the US market closed.

Netanyahu said he sees "this war ending a lot faster than people think," the Israeli leader told a press conference, while vowing that Iran's efforts to "blackmail the world" by shutting the Strait of Hormuz were doomed to failure.

The broad-based S&P 500 finished at 6,606.49, down 0.3 per cent but up about 50 points from its session lows.

The stock market's move higher was "kind of reflexive," said Briefing.com analyst Patrick O'Hare, who described the market's reaction as a mix of optimism and caution.

The market "is taking it somewhat hopefully but also reservedly because the fact of the matter is that the war isn't over yet," he said.

Surging energy prices had battered equity markets earlier Thursday, with Frankfurt, Paris and London all losing two percent or more following similar declines in Tokyo and other Asian markets.

International benchmark Brent crude rose more than five percent to top US$115 per barrel and US contract WTI briefly topped US$100 as Tehran targeted regional installations in retaliation for an Israeli strike on a site serving its massive South Pars field, which it shares with Qatar.

But oil markets moderated later in the day, with Brent finishing up 1.2 per cent and WTI ending slightly lower. 

European gas prices also soared by more than a third on fears of the impact on energy supplies before edging back down.

"The prospect of a longer, more drawn-out conflict is in sharp focus, as both sides ratchet up attacks on energy infrastructure," said Susannah Streeter, chief investment strategist at Wealth Club.

"Downbeat sentiment is spreading fast ... as investors assess the repercussions for the global economy," she added.

Repeated attacks on energy infrastructure in recent days have only deepened fears that the US and Israeli war on Iran launched on Feb 28 may be evolving into an energy war with painful and lasting consequences for the global economy.

Energy markets looked poised for more volatility given bombastic rhetoric.

US President Donald Trump warned of a furious US response if Tehran did not halt strikes on Qatar.

Iran responded that it would have "zero restraint" if its energy infrastructure was hit again. 

In foreign exchange markets, the dollar fell by more than one per cent against the euro, the yen and the pound following a two-day round of central bank meetings. 

The Bank of England, the Bank of Japan and the European Central Bank all held interest rates on Thursday, after the US Federal Reserve had kept its borrowing costs unchanged on Wednesday. 

ECB President Christine Lagarde issued a stark warning that the world was undergoing a "severe shock" due to the war, posing a "risk to the euro area economy," potentially weighing on growth and pushing up inflation, she said. 

"A prolonged war could increase energy prices further and for longer than currently expected and also weigh on confidence," she said. 

Lagarde remained tight-lipped on future monetary policy decisions but analyst O'Hare said the retreat in the dollar reflected investor belief that the other central banks are more likely to hike rights in the coming period, whereas the Fed is more likely to keep rates flat.

WORLD WAR II 

But the Japanese premier appeared keen to make the most of her time with the US president, which will also include a dinner.

She was twice seen ostentatiously looking at her watch as the press conference in the Oval Office neared its end.

But the meeting appeared to highlight once again Takaichi's ability to charm Trump, following a similarly friendly meeting in Tokyo in October during which she said she would nominate him for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Nearly three weeks into the Middle East war launched by Israel and the United States, Netanyahu said Tehran no longer has the capacity to enrich uranium or manufacture ballistic missiles.

"We are winning, and Iran is being decimated," he said at a press conference.

Netanyahu hailed his cooperation with US President Donald Trump and said, without providing a specific timeframe, that he sees "this war ending a lot faster than people think".

His comments came after the US said there was no deadline to end the war that the two countries launched against Iran on Feb 28.

Netanyahu also insisted Israel "acted alone" with Wednesday's strike on Iran's South Pars gas field, which supplies about 70 per cent of Iran's domestic needs.

Trump indicated that he did not know in advance about Israel's raid on Iran's South Pars. But he said he had told Netanyahu not to hit Iranian gas fields again.

"We get along great. It's coordinated, but on occasion, he'll do something" that the United States opposes, Trump said.

Netanyahu rejected suggestions that he had dragged Trump into the conflict, implying that he was the junior partner in the joint assault on Iran.

"Does anyone really think that someone can tell President Trump what to do?" Netanyahu said. "He didn't need any convincing," he added.

At the press conference, Netanyahu also said he was "not sure who's running Iran right now".

"Mojtaba, the replacement ayatollah, has not shown his face," he said, in a reference to Iran's newly appointed supreme leader, the son of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in an Israeli airstrike on the first day of the war.

"We're seeing cracks, and we're trying to propagate them as fast as we can, not only in the top command, we're seeing cracks in the field," Netanyahu said.

"ZERO RESTRAINT"

The Iranian military's Khatam Al-Anbiya operational command vowed the "complete destruction" of Gulf energy infrastructure if the Israeli attack on its energy facilities was repeated.

Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on social media there would be "ZERO restraint" if Iran's infrastructure was hit again.

Energy markets have already been left reeling by Iranian attacks on the world's largest liquefied natural gas plant in Qatar and refineries in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

Iranian missiles hit Qatar's huge Ras Laffan natural gas complex in retaliation for Israel's air raid on the South Pars gas field.

The latest attack on Ras Laffan caused "extensive damage" that QatarEnergy said could cost US$20 billion a year in lost revenue and take five years to repair.

Iran also struck elsewhere in the region, with a drone crashing into the Samref refinery in Saudi Arabia's Red Sea port of Yanbu, the Saudi defence ministry said.

The Saudi government said it reserved the "right to take military actions" in response.

In Kuwait, drone attacks sparked fires at the Mina Abdullah and Mina Al-Ahmadi refineries, which have a combined capacity of 800,000 barrels per day.

And in Israel, an oil refinery in the port of Haifa was hit on Thursday. Black smoke was seen rising from the complex.

The European Union, following a meeting of the bloc's leaders in Brussels, called for a "moratorium", meanwhile, on strikes against energy and water facilities.

"The European Council calls for de-escalation and maximum restraint, the protection of civilians and civilian infrastructure and full respect of international law by all parties," they said.

Amid growing concern over the economic fallout from the conflict, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the Netherlands said they would "contribute to appropriate efforts to ensure safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz."

But they gave few details.

Rome and Berlin later insisted that any action would only happen if there was a ceasefire.

French President Emmanuel Macron condemned the "reckless escalation" in attacks and called for "direct talks between the Americans and Iranians."

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer's office warned that "attacks on critical infrastructure risked pushing the region further into crisis."

India and China also expressed new concern about their oil supplies, which flow through the Strait of Hormuz.

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said there is no timeframe for ending the war, but that "we're very much on track" and Trump would choose when to end fighting.

"It will be at the president's choosing, ultimately, where we say, 'Hey, we've achieved what we need to,'" he said.

The Trump administration is reportedly seeking an additional US$200 billion in war funding from Congress, and Hegseth said "that number could move."

"Obviously, it takes money to kill bad guys," he said.

JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said on Thursday (Mar 19) that its fighter jets had struck several Iranian naval vessels in the Caspian Sea the previous day, including vessels equipped with anti-submarine missiles.

The targets included ships equipped with missile systems, support vessels and patrol craft, the military said, adding that a port command centre was also hit in the operation.

The targeted Iranian ships were also equipped with aerial surveillance systems and anti-submarine missiles, the military said.

"It is one of the most significant strikes conducted by the IDF since the start of Operation Roaring Lion," the military said in a statement.

"We have for the first time carried out strikes in northern Iran in the Caspian Sea," military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani told journalists in a separate briefing.

"This is the first time we have done that in our history ... We were able to target their naval shipyard where they can fix or build new ships," he said, adding that Israel had struck more than 200 targets across Iran over the past 36 hours.

BEIJING: China's foreign minister told his British counterpart on Thursday (Mar 19) that the two countries had a responsibility to maintain international peace and security, and renewed calls for a ceasefire in the Middle East.

Beijing is a partner of Iran, which has been targeted by US-Israeli attacks since last month, but has also criticised Tehran's strikes against Gulf states housing US military bases.

In a phone call, China's Wang Yi told British Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper that their countries should "consistently take actions conducive to peace", according to a readout from Beijing's foreign ministry.

They should work together to "prevent further damage to the international order and the erosion of the foundations of global peace", Wang told Cooper.

A "prolonged conflict yields no winners", Wang said.

Cooper visited Saudi Arabia last week on the UK's first ministerial visit to the region since the start of the war.

US President Donald Trump has voiced disappointment with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer over what he calls Britain's lack of support in the conflict.

The UK leader said on Monday that Britain was "taking the necessary action to defend ourselves and our allies" but would "not be drawn into the wider war".

Starmer said Britain was working with allies towards a "viable" plan to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, but ruled out a NATO mission.

Beijing condemned on Thursday the killing of Iranian national security chief Ali Larijani by an Israeli air strike, calling it "unacceptable".