U.K.’s Starmer ‘fed up’ with Putin and Trump’s actions raising energy prices – National

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer is “fed up” with higher gas prices due to the actions of world leaders like U.S. President Donald Trump, he said in a recent interview.

Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz has had global oil markets jittery, with the price of Brent crude oil – the international benchmark – rising to US$96.96 a barrel on Friday.

This has caused an energy crisis for Britain and much of Europe, and families in the U.K. are feeling the pinch, Starmer said.

The crisis in Iran has outlined the need for “energy independence,” Starmer said.

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“The only way to get energy independence is to go even more quickly to renewables because we’re not going to get it on the international market,” he said.

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Oil markets react to U.S.-Iran ceasefire

The Iran war has emerged as a fissure between the U.S. and its European allies, particularly Spain.

While the EU, including Spain, welcomed the ceasefire announced earlier this week, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez criticized the U.S.

“The Spanish government will not applaud those who set the world on fire just because they turn up with a bucket,” Sanchez wrote on his X account.

The Strait of Hormuz remained closed and Israel launched fresh attacks on Lebanon on Friday, which the United States and Iran each flagged as violations of their ceasefire deal on the eve of their first peace talks over the war.

U.S. Vice-President JD Vance, who will lead the U.S. delegation, set off for the talks in Pakistan, saying he expected a positive outcome, but “if they’re going to try to play us, then they’re going to find the negotiating team is not that receptive.”

The two-day-old ceasefire has halted the campaign of U.S. and Israeli air strikes on Iran. But it has so far done nothing to end the blockade of the strait, which has caused the biggest-ever disruption to global energy supplies, or to calm a parallel war waged by Israel against Iran’s Hezbollah allies in Lebanon.

— with files from Reuters

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