By Nandita Bose, Steven Scheer and Yomna Ehab
WASHINGTON/JERUSALEM/CAIRO, April 1 (Reuters) – Global oil supplies are expected to be hit twice as hard this month as in March, the International Energy Agency said on Wednesday, underlining the urgent need to resolve the conflict over Iran that U.S. President Donald Trump said could end soon.
While Trump signalled he could wind down the war within weeks even without a deal, he also scaled up threats to pull the United States out of the NATO defence alliance if European states did not help stop Iran blocking the Strait of Hormuz.
“I was never swayed by NATO. I always knew they were a paper tiger, and (Russian President Vladimir) Putin knows that too, by the way,” Trump told Britain’s Daily Telegraph, saying he had moved beyond merely reconsidering U.S. membership.
The remarks on the war underscored Washington’s shifting and at times contradictory statements about a conflict that has killed thousands, spread across the region and caused unprecedented energy disruption.
“We’ll be leaving (the Iran conflict) very soon,” Trump told reporters, saying that could be “within two weeks, maybe two weeks, maybe three.”
“Iran doesn’t have to make a deal, no,” he said, when asked if successful diplomacy was a prerequisite for the U.S. to end what it calls “Operation Epic Fury”.
TRUMP TO ADDRESS NATION ON IRAN
International Energy Agency head Fatih Birol said the main issue so far from Iran’s effective closure of the major global energy shipping route, the Strait of Hormuz, was the lack of jet fuel and diesel.
“We are seeing that in Asia, but soon, I think, in April or May, it would come to Europe,” Birol told a podcast with Nicolai Tangen, the head of Norway’s sovereign wealth fund. The loss of oil in April would be twice that lost in March, he said.
Businesses around the world have been hit by the conflict, with cosmetics and tea among the latest sectors to report pain.
The United States had previously threatened to intensify operations if Tehran did not accept a 15-point U.S. ceasefire framework demanding that Iran not pursue nuclear weapons or uranium enrichment and fully reopens the Strait of Hormuz.
The White House said Trump would address the nation “to provide an important update on Iran” at 9 p.m. EDT on Wednesday (0100 GMT on Thursday).
Rubio told Fox News Channel’s “Hannity” program there was potential for a “direct meeting at some point” and the United States could “see the finish line”.
“It’s not today, it’s not tomorrow, but it is coming,” Rubio added.
(Reporting by Reuters bureaux; Writing by Costas Pitas, Martin Petty, Philippa Fletcher; Editing by Cynthia Osterman, Lincoln Feast and Alison Williams)
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