US-Iran war live: Trump claims he and Xi are agreed on how Middle East conflict should end

We heard from Donald Trump on Friday, who was speaking during his final meeting with Chinese president Xi Jinping.

The US president said discussed Iran with Xi and that they do not want Iran to have nuclear weapons and “want the straits open”.

The two leaders met at the walled-off Zhongnanhai complex in Beijing as Trump wraps up his state visit to China.

“We’ve settled a lot of different problems that other people wouldn’t have been able to solve,” Trump said.

Economic growth in Germany will likely take a significant hit from the effects of the Iran war in the second quarter, the federal economy ministry warned on Friday.

Growth was just 0.3 per cent in the first quarter.

“Rising prices, supply chain issues and uncertainty are weighing on sentiment among businesses and households,” the ministry said in its monthly report.

Former CIA director Leon Panetta has said that Iran has “a gun to our head” because of its stranglehold over the Strait of Hormuz and warned that President Donald Trump has bitten off more than he can chew.

Panetta was speaking Thursday as Trump and Chinese Premier Xi Jinping ⁠agreed at their summit in Beijing that the Strait must ⁠be reopened ​for ⁠the free flow of energy.

“My sense is that it’s very likely this war, which was supposed to end after six to eight weeks, is probably going to continue for a number of months,” the ex-official told The Times.

Israeli defence minister Israel Katz has criticised Barcelona’s teenage star Lamine Yamal for waving a Palestinian flag during celebrations of the Spanish league title win.

Yamal, 18, waved a large Palestinian flag from an open-top bus during a victory parade, which drew about 750,000 people.

“Lamine Yamal chose to incite hate against Israel while our soldiers combat the terrorist organization Hamas, an organization that massacred, raped and burned Jewish children, women and the elderly on October 7 [2023],” Israel Katz wrote on X.

Dismissing Katz’s claims, Spanish prime minister Pedro Sanchez said Yamal made Spain “proud” for waving a Palestinian flag at a victory parade.

“Those who think that waving the flag of a state is ‘inciting hatred’, they have either lost their minds or they have been blinded by their own disgrace,” Sanchez wrote on X.

“Lamine just expressed the solidarity with Palestine that millions of Spaniards feel. Yet another reason to be proud of him”.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu quietly visited the United Arab Emirates during the Israeli-US war with Iran, his office said this week. The UAE later denied any secret visit had occurred.

Netanyahu met with UAE president Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan in a gathering that “resulted in a historic breakthrough in relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates,” according to the Israeli statement. The Gulf nation normalized relations with Israel in 2020.

The UAE’s official WAM news agency later posted an article denying “reports circulating” about a Netanyahu visit. According to WAM, the country’s relations with Israel “are public and conducted within the framework of the well-known and officially declared Abraham Accords, and are not based on non-transparent or unofficial arrangements.”

The Emirati report also denied any Israeli military delegation was received in the UAE.

US president Donald Trump said this morning that he discussed Iran with Chinese president Xi Jinping and that they do not want Iran to have nuclear weapons and “want the straits open”.

The two leaders met ‌at the ‌walled-off Zhongnanhai complex in Beijing ⁠as Trump wraps up his state visit to China.

“We’ve settled a lot of different problems that other people wouldn’t have been able to solve,” Trump said.

Ayman al-Zain watched on a recent afternoon as a bulldozer cleared the rubble of what used to be his sports clothing store, which was one of dozens of buildings destroyed in Israeli strikes against the Hezbollah militant group.

With a nominal truce in place that has reduced but not halted the fighting, Al-Zain tried to assess whether to rebuild the shop in Beirut’s southern suburbs that he once hoped to pass down to his kids. But it’s unlikely he will be able to do so anytime soon, and not only because of the fear of more airstrikes.

“Everything is expensive,” he told The Associated Press. “If I want to open a new store and get mannequins, hangers and some accessories, the prices are very different than before.”

The White House last night said Donald Trump and Xi Jinping agreed during talks in Beijing on the need to keep the Strait of Hormuz shipping lane open.

Xi made it clear that China’s opposition to the militarisation of the strait and any effort to charge a toll for its use, White House added.

Trump said Xi also promised not to send Iran military equipment. “He said he’s not going to give military equipment, that’s a big statement,” Trump said.

Iran effectively shut the waterway in response to US-Israeli attacks, which began on 28 February, causing an unprecedented disruption to global energy supplies. China is close to Iran and the main buyer of its oil.

The US paused its attacks on Iran last month but began a blockade of the country’s ports.

Iran said it will not enter more talks with the US unless five conditions are met, including paying reparations for the war and accepting Iran’s sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz.

The White House is unlikely to accept those demands, which would essentially formalise Iran’s control over a waterway that was open to international traffic before the war.

Iran’s senior vice president, Mohammadreza Aref, yesterday said the strait belongs to Iran and that Tehran would not give it up “at any price,” state TV reported. “It has always been our property,” Aref said.