WASHINGTON, March 16 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday the U.S. forces have sunk all the Iranian mine-laying ships but it remains unclear if Iran has started laying mines in the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world's oil passes.
"We don't know that they have dropped any in," Trump said at a press conference.
"With more than 30 mine-laying ships destroyed, we hit, to the best of our knowledge, all of their mine-laying ships," Trump claimed, while noting that Iran now can put mines on other types of ships and drop them in the strait.
Trump said the U.S. military has struck more than 7,000 targets across Iran and "literally destroyed everything" on Iran's Kharg Island except oil facilities.
"As you know, we attacked Kharg Island and knocked it ... literally destroyed everything on the island except for the area where the oil is, I call it the pipes," Trump said.
"We left the pipes. We didn't wanna do that but that -- we will do that, we can do that on five minutes' notice," Trump claimed without ruling out further and broader strikes on the island amid the intensifying war. The island handles about 90 percent of Iran's crude exports, according to reports.
According to Trump, the U.S. military has continued operations "in full force" against Iran over the past few days and has achieved a 90 percent reduction in Iran's ballistic missile launches as well as a 95 percent reduction in drone attacks.
However, reports said Iran continued launching missile and drone attacks on targets in Israel and U.S. allies in the Middle East on Monday. ■
