By Maya Gebeily, Emily Rose and Jarrett Renshaw
DUBAI/JERUSALEM/PALM BEACH, Florida, March 15 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump said on Sunday his administration is talking to seven countries about helping to secure the Strait of Hormuz amid the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, calling on them to help protect ships in the vital waterway that Tehran has mostly blocked to oil tanker traffic.
With the conflict creating turmoil across the Middle East and shaking up global energy markets in its third week, Trump insisted that nations relying heavily on oil from the Gulf have a responsibility to protect the strait.
"I'm demanding that these countries come in and protect their own territory because it is their territory," Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on the way from Florida to Washington. "It's the place from which they get their energy."
Though he declined to identify the seven governments that his administration has contacted, Trump said this weekend that he expected many countries would send warships to allow shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, a conduit for 20% of the world's oil.
He said in a social media post he hoped China, France, Japan, South Korea, Britain and others would participate.
In an interview with the Financial Times on Sunday, Trump ratcheted up pressure on European allies to help protect the strait, warning that NATO faces a "very bad" future if its members fail to come to Washington's aid.
Trump also said Washington is in contact with Iran but expressed doubt that Tehran is prepared for serious negotiations to end the conflict.
U.S. officials responding to economic uncertainty over high oil prices predicted on Sunday that the war on Iran would end within weeks and that a drop in energy costs would follow, despite Iran's assertion that it remains "stable and strong" and ready to defend itself.
Trump had threatened more strikes on Iran's main oil export hub Kharg Island over the weekend and said he was not ready to reach a deal to end the war which has shut off the vital Strait of Hormuz.
The Trump administration plans to announce as early as this week that multiple countries have agreed to form a coalition to escort ships through the narrow waterway but they are still discussing whether those operations would begin before or after hostilities end, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing unnamed U.S. officials.
Trump offered few specifics about the kind of assistance he wanted from other countries to open up the strait, except to say some have minesweepers and "a certain type of boat that could help us."
Asian markets were in a wary mood on Monday as the Gulf hostilities kept oil prices elevated. Brent rose 0.1% to $103.27 a barrel, while U.S. crude fell 0.7% to $97.99.
IRAN DENIES TRUMP CLAIM ON NEGOTIATIONS
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Trump, who on Friday said the U.S. Navy would "soon" start escorting oil tankers, has said previously that Iran wants to negotiate, but Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi earlier on Sunday disputed that claim.
"We have never asked for a ceasefire, and we have never asked even for negotiations," Araqchi told CBS' "Face the Nation" program. "We are ready to defend ourselves for as long as it takes."
With crude oil prices hovering around $100 a barrel, Trump administration officials insisted that all signs point to a relatively quick end to the conflict.
"This conflict will certainly come to the end in the next few weeks — could be sooner than that," U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright told ABC's "This Week" program.
Trump on Sunday did not put a timeframe on concluding the war but said oil prices "are going to come tumbling down as soon as it's over, and it's going to be over pretty quick."
But the U.S. president said he saw no reason to declare victory yet.
"I think I just say they're decimated." Trump told reporters. "If we left right now, it would take them 10 years or more to rebuild, but I'm still not declaring it over."
Meanwhile, Araqchi sought to project an image of strength and resilience despite waves of U.S. and Israeli air strikes that have killed a number of Iranian leaders, sunk much of the Islamic Republic's navy and devastated its missile arsenal.
"It's not a war of survival. We are stable and strong enough," Araqchi told CBS. "We don't see any reason why we should talk with Americans, because we were talking with them when they decided to attack us, and that was for the second time."
KHARG ISLAND
Trump said on Saturday that U.S. strikes had "totally demolished" much of Kharg Island and warned of more, telling NBC News on Saturday, "We may hit it a few more times just for fun."
The comments marked a sharp escalation from Trump, who had previously said the U.S. was targeting only military sites on Kharg, and dealt a blow to diplomatic efforts to end a war that has spread across the Middle East and killed more than 2,000 people, most in Iran and Lebanon.
With global air transport heavily disrupted and no clear end in sight, Iran's ability to choke off traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, the conduit for a fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas, has emerged as a decisive threat to the global economy.
Although some Iranian vessels have continued to pass and a few ships from other countries have successfully made the crossing, the passage has been effectively closed for most of the world's tanker traffic since the United States and Israel attacked Iran on February 28 at the start of an intensive bombing campaign that has hit thousands of targets across the country.
(Reporting by Maya Gebeily in Dubai, Emily Rose in Jerusalem and Jarrett Renshaw in Palm Beach, Florida; Additional reporting by Reuters bureaux; Writing by James Mackenzie, David Morgan and Matt Spetalnick; Editing by Sergio Non, Chizu Nomiyama, William Mallard, Gareth Jones, Andrew Heavens, Deepa Babington, Diane Craft and Michael Perry)
