(Reuters) <\/p>\n\n\n\n
WASHINGTON\/DUBAI, April 13 – The U.S. military began a blockade of Iran’s ports on Monday, President Donald Trump said, and Tehran threatened to \u200bretaliate against its Gulf neighbors’ ports after weekend talks in Islamabad on ending the war broke down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A U.S. official said there was continued engagement with Iran, and forward motion on \u200ctrying to get to an agreement. Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif also said efforts were still under way to resolve the conflict.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But oil prices climbed back to $100 per barrel, with no sign of a swift reopening of the Strait of Hormuz to ease the biggest ever disruption in supplies and broader concerns over the durability of a two-week ceasefire agreement reached last week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trump said<\/a> Iran had been in touch on Monday and wanted to make a deal but that he would not sanction any \u200bagreement allowing Tehran to have a nuclear weapon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Iran will not have a nuclear weapon,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “We can’t let a country blackmail or extort the world.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Since the United States \u200band Israel began the war on February 28, Iran effectively shut the Strait of Hormuz to all vessels except its own, saying passage would be permitted \u2060only under Iranian control and subject to a fee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trump has said Washington would block Iranian vessels and any ships that paid such tolls and that any Iranian “fast-attack” ships<\/a> that went near the blockade would be eliminated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Brigadier \u200bGeneral Reza Talaei-Nik, a spokesperson for Iran\u2019s Ministry of Defense, warned that foreign military efforts to police the strait would escalate the crisis and instability in global energy security.<\/p>\n\n\n\n