• Trump terms US Supreme Court verdict on tariffs “ridiculous”.
• Court verdict, Trump’s move throw world trade into confusion.
• Trump has raised global tariffs to 15% following court verdict.
  

President Donald Trump on Monday said any countries that wanted to “play games” after a key US Supreme Court tariff ruling would face much higher tariffs.

The court said tariffs Trump imposed last year based on a national emergency law were illegal, rekindling uncertainty from other countries about already signed or pending trade deals with the United States.

“Any Country that wants to ‘play games’ with the ridiculous Supreme Court decision, especially those that have ‘Ripped Off’ the US for years, and even decades, will be met with a much higher Tariff, and worse, than that which they just recently agreed to. BUYER BEWARE!!!” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post.

Trump, on February 20, vowed to continue his global trade war after the US Supreme Court ruled that he lacked the power to unilaterally set tariffs on imports

Responding to the court verdict, the US president said he was undeterred by what he called a ridiculous ruling, announcing new 10% tariff on imports from all countries.

A day later, he said he will raise the temporary tariff from 10% to 15% on US imports from all countries, the maximum level allowed under the law.

The new levies are grounded in a separate but untested law, known as Section 122, that allows tariffs up to 15% but requires congressional approval to extend them after 150 days.

In a social media post, Trump said he would use the 150-day period to work on issuing other “legally permissible” tariffs. The administration intends to rely on two other statutes that permit import taxes on specific products or countries based on investigations into national security or unfair trade practices.

“I, as President of the United States of America, will be, effective immediately, raising the 10% Worldwide Tariff on Countries, many of which have been ‘ripping’ the US off for decades, without retribution (until I came along!), to the fully allowed, and legally tested, 15% level,” he wrote in his post.

The US Supreme Court’s annulment of Trump’s tariffs and his subsequent move to impose a temporary 15% global tariff have thrown world trade into a new bout of confusion.

For some countries — notably China and Brazil — the new 15% baseline is substantially lower than the US tariffs they had been dealing with.

But for the couple of dozen countries that had sought to avoid the impact of the reciprocal tariffs by clinching bilateral deals with the United States — Britain, the European Union and Japan among them — the question now is whether those deals will stick.

• Any strike, even limited, would be considered aggression: Iran.
• EU calls for diplomatic solution ahead of talks.
• Talk schedule confirmed by Iran, Oman but not by US.
  

Iran said on Monday that a US attack of any scale would spur the Islamic republic to respond “ferociously”, after President Donald Trump said he was considering limited strikes against the country.

The United States has built up forces in the Middle East to pile pressure on Iran to make a deal at negotiations due to restart on Thursday, with Trump weighing a limited strike if no agreement is reached.

On Monday Iran’s foreign ministry reiterated that any strike, even limited, would be “would be regarded as an act of aggression. Period”.

“And any state would react to an act of aggression as part of its inherent right of self-defence ferociously so that’s what we would do,” ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei said at a briefing in Tehran attended by an AFP journalist.

The two countries concluded a second round of indirect talks in Switzerland on Tuesday under Omani mediation.

Further talks, confirmed by Iran and Oman but not by the United States, are scheduled for Thursday.

The European Union, which has been sidelined in mediation on Iran, called for a diplomatic solution ahead of the talks.

“We don’t need another war in this region. We already have a lot,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said ahead of a meeting of EU foreign ministers.

“It is true that Iran is at its weakest point that they have been. We should be really using this time to find a diplomatic solution.”

Fears of conflict

Iran has, however, insisted only discussions on the country’s nuclear programme are on the table at mediated talks. The West believes the programme is aimed at making a bomb, which Tehran denies.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi is leading the negotiations for Iran, while the United States is represented by envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Trump is wondering why Iran has not “capitulated” in the face of Washington’s military deployment, Witkoff said in an interview with Fox News broadcast over the weekend.

Baqaei responded Monday by saying that Iranians had never capitulated at any point in their history.

Trump had initially threatened military action over the violent crackdown on the protests that rights groups say saw thousands of people killed by security forces, but his attention soon shifted to Iran’s nuclear programme.

Scattered anti-government protests have continued in the country, despite the threat of suppression and arrests.

Students rallied to commemorate those killed in competing pro- and anti-government demonstrations as the university semester restarted over the weekend.

Iranians’ fears of a new conflict have grown and the concerns have also prompted several foreign countries to urge their citizens to leave Iran.

India on Monday joined Sweden, Serbia, Poland and Australia in calling for its citizens — estimated at 10,000 in the country by the foreign ministry — to leave Iran.

KATHMANDU: A bus in Nepal skidded off a mountain road and plunged into an icy river, police said Monday, killing at least 19 people, including a British tourist.

The bus, en route from the tourist city of Pokhara to the capital city Kathmandu, fell more than 200 metres (655 feet) into the Trishuli River in Dhading district in the early hours of Monday morning.

“Out of 44, in total 19 people died, and 25 are undergoing treatment,” senior local police officer Prakash Dahal told AFP, confirming one British citizen was among the dead.

One Chinese person and a New Zealander were injured, he said, without giving further details.

Mohan Prasad Neupane, information officer at the district administration office, said the rescue operation had been completed by dawn.

“The injured are undergoing treatment,” Neupane said.

In July 2024, two buses with more than 50 people on board were swept off the highway into the same river after a landslide.

Deadly crashes are relatively common in the Himalayan republic because of poor roads, badly maintained vehicles and reckless driving.