US President Donald Trump announced on Tuesday that all mines in the international waters of the Strait of Hormuz would be removed or detonated, warning that any ship or boat that plants new mines in the strait will be destroyed.
Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform that all mines had been removed and/or detonated from the international waters of the strait according to the US Navy, stressing that a “zero tolerance policy” remains in place regarding mine planting.
temporary shipping lane
Simultaneously, Iran informed the United States of its conditions regarding the Strait through Pakistani Army Chief Field Marshal Asim Munir, while Omani Foreign Minister Badr Al Busaidi held talks in Tehran concerning the future of navigation in the strategic waterway.
The Iranian Foreign Ministry said that Al-Busaidi met with his counterpart Abbas Araqchi in Tehran. A joint statement indicated that the two ministers discussed a phased framework that would provide a practical and implementable basis for the safe resumption of navigation through the Strait of Hormuz.
The statement explained that the framework includes the creation of a “joint temporary shipping corridor” through the strait, along with the implementation of a joint project to clear it of mines.
He added that technical negotiations would continue to reach an agreement on a permanent shipping lane and future arrangements for managing the strait, as well as establishing a mechanism for information exchange, managing maritime traffic, and providing related navigational and security services. Both sides also emphasized the importance of holding joint discussions with the Gulf states.
The Omani-Iranian talks come as Muscat and Tehran, as two countries bordering the Strait of Hormuz, have been seeking for weeks to reach an agreement on arrangements to regulate maritime traffic in the strait. Tehran previously stated that the geographical coordinates of a new shipping lane in the strait had been agreed upon.
However, Iranian officials stressed that the full reopening of the strait is conditional on the United States responding to Tehran’s demands, including lifting the naval blockade, canceling oil sanctions, and unfreezing Iranian assets abroad.
In the same context, the Iranian news agency Tasnim reported that Tehran conveyed its conditions regarding the Strait of Hormuz to Washington through the Pakistani army chief, who visited Iran on Monday. The agency quoted a source close to the Iranian negotiating team as saying that Munir's visit aimed to pave the way for negotiations and convey the Iranian position to the American side, not to deliver a threatening message from Washington.
According to the source, Iran is demanding that the United States return to the “Islamabad Memorandum” and implement its provisions, particularly Article 5, which concerns arrangements for the safe passage of commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz and coordination with the Sultanate of Oman regarding the management of the strait and maritime services therein.
This comes as shipping traffic in the strait, through which in peacetime about a fifth of the world's oil and liquefied natural gas exports pass, remains largely paralyzed nearly six months after the outbreak of war.
The United States and Israel launched a large-scale attack on Iran on February 28, and Tehran responded by imposing a blockade on the Strait of Hormuz, before Washington imposed a counter-blockade on Iranian ports.
On June 18, Washington and Tehran signed a memorandum of understanding on freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, but its implementation has stalled due to disagreements over the strait's security. The United States also resumed attacks on Iran between July 8 and 24, and Tehran responded by targeting what it claimed were US military installations and equipment in Arab countries.
The simultaneous diplomatic moves by Oman and Pakistan reflect efforts to find a negotiated formula that would allow navigation to gradually resume, in conjunction with a joint Iranian-Omani project to remove mines and establish a temporary shipping lane, at a time when Washington asserts that it has removed the mines in international waters and threatens to destroy any party that plants new mines.
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