President Trump said on social media early Sunday that a U.S. service member who was missing since Iran shot down a fighter jet over its territory has been found in a rescue involving “dozens of aircraft.”
The crew member had been missing since Friday, when the Iranian military downed a U.S. F-15E Strike Eagle. A second crew member was rescued earlier.
Trump wrote that the aviator is injured but “will be just fine,” adding that he took refuge “in the treacherous mountains of Iran.”
Earlier, Trump warned Iran to open the crucial Strait of Hormuz by his Monday deadline.
The war began with joint U.S.-Israeli strikes on Feb. 28 and has killed thousands, shaken global markets, cut off key shipping routes and caused skyrocketing fuel prices. Both sides have threatened and hit civilian targets, bringing warnings of possible war crimes.
Here is the latest:
Trump said the United States didn’t confirm the rescue of the first aviator from the F-15 fighter jet that was shot down in Iran on Friday “because we did not want to jeopardize our second rescue operation.”
In his social media post just after midnight, Trump said the second aviator “was behind enemy lines in the treacherous mountains of Iran, being hunted down by our enemies, who were getting closer and closer by the hour.”
He said that the rescue involved “dozens of aircraft” and that the U.S. had been monitoring his location “24 hours a day, and diligently planning for his rescue.”
In other developments, Senegal announced it had banned all but essential foreign trips for government ministers as part of cost-saving measures triggered by the energy crisis linked to the war.
Senegal, like many African countries, imports most of the petroleum products it consumes. That leaves its economy vulnerable to supply disruptions such as the chokehold on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, which has sent the price of crude soaring.
Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko said his office is taking steps to limit public expenditure, pointing out that initial budget forecasts were based on an oil price of $62 per barrel. It is now almost double that.
“I have taken a number of drastic measures to restrict everything related to government spending, including the cancellation of all nonessential missions abroad,” the government-owned newspaper Le Soleil quoted Sonko as saying.
He added that he canceled several trips, including to Niger, Spain and France.
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