Tehran, Iran - Iran's foreign minister said Tuesday that talks with the President Donald Trump's administration were not on the agenda as Tehran's powerful Revolutionary Guards vowed to block the export of oil from the region as long as the US-Israeli war continues.
"I don't think talking with the Americans would be on our agenda anymore," Abbas Araghchi told PBS News, saying Tehran had a "very bitter experience" during previous negotiations with the US.
On February 28, the US and Israel launched unprovoked strikes against Iran that killed its supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and triggered a war that has spread across the Middle East.
The Israeli and US attacks took place two days before Washington and Tehran were scheduled to hold talks following three prior rounds of negotiations. Omani mediators in those discussions had said there was "significant progress" in the talks.
Iran has responded to the US-Israeli attacks with drone and missile strikes targeting Israel and US interests across the region.
Shipping traffic through the strategic Strait of Hormuz, through which nearly 20% of the world's crude oil usually transits, has been severely disrupted.
Iranian forces have repeatedly targeted oil tankers passing through the strategic waterway since the war began.
"The Iranian armed forces... will not allow the export of a single litre of oil from the region to the hostile side and its partners until further notice," Revolutionary Guards spokesperson Ali Mohammad Naini said, according to a report from Iran's Tasnim news agency.
Iran ready to continue fighting "as long as it takes"
In the interview with PBS News, Araghchi insisted that Iran was acting in self-defense.
"We are prepared, we have been prepared to continue attacking them with our missiles as long as needed and as long as it takes," he said.
Late Monday, Iranian deputy foreign minister Kazem Gharibabadi said some countries in the region and elsewhere had reached out to Iran to push for a ceasefire.
"China, Russia, and France, and even some countries in the region, are in contact with us," he told state TV. "Some of them are willing to do something to stop this war or establish a ceasefire."
Gharibabadi insisted Iran "did not start the aggression and the war... we are defending ourselves."