Iran refuses to reopen Strait of Hormuz without US concessions

Iran said the Strait of Hormuz will remain closed unless Washington meets a series of demands, even as negotiations with Oman over new shipping routes through the strategic waterway approach their final stages, The Washington Post reported.

Tehran is demanding that the United States lift economic and oil sanctions, end its naval blockade, release frozen Iranian state assets and provide full financial compensation for war damages.

Iran also wants Washington to permanently end military threats and actions against Iran and its regional allies.

Iranian officials have said the negotiations with Oman concern the technical and legal arrangements governing maritime transit and that completing those discussions would not itself reopen the strait.

Iran maintains that it is not negotiating directly with Washington and is instead using regional intermediaries for communications with the U.S.

President Donald Trump rejected Tehran’s demand for compensation and instructed U.S. representatives to seek payments from Iran for American casualties and damage attributed to the Islamic Republic in regional conflicts.

The economic consequences of the continued closure are also drawing concern inside Iran.

Majidreza Hariri, head of the Iran-China Joint Chamber of Commerce, estimated that the U.S. blockade of the Strait of Hormuz will cost Iran approximately $18 billion annually, according to comments reported by Iranian media outlet Khabar Online earlier this week.

“We must not get used to the blockade as we did with sanctions,” Hariri told Khabar Online. “We should impose the cost of lifting the blockade on the US, even through war.”

Hariri called for Tehran to pursue whatever means are necessary to end the blockade, including diplomacy, threats or a return to military conflict.

His comments followed reports that Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian had begun promoting an approach aimed at circumventing the naval blockade.

The United States, meanwhile, continues to enforce the maritime blockade as the indirect diplomatic contacts continue.