US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Tuesday that ships are currently transiting the Strait of Hormuz and that Iran and Oman are holding negotiations, in which Washington is involved, over safe passage through the waterway.
Rubio said there was a process of dialogue and negotiation between Oman and Iran, in which the United States takes part, aimed at determining how more vessels can transit safely in the short term while both sides move toward broader talks on denuclearization.
He said ships and oil were passing through the strait at that very moment, meaning the route remained open. Rubio added that progress had been made in the talks, though no final conclusion had been reached.
Rubio made the remarks during a meeting in Washington with his Paraguayan counterpart, Ruben Ramirez Lezcano.
Bessent points to imminent deal
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said earlier the same day that Washington and Tehran could reach an agreement within a day or two to reopen the strait to commercial shipping traffic.
President Donald Trump suspended an attack on Iran over the weekend that he described as the largest since World War Two, in order to allow negotiations to proceed. He had announced the talks would begin on Monday, but Tehran denied this.
Trump accused Iran of being hypocritical for not following through on the negotiations he said were underway, and warned the Islamic Republic that it faced a last chance to sign a good deal.
Two-phase talks
According to Trump, the negotiations are split into a first phase focused on reopening the Strait of Hormuz and a second phase on denuclearization, intended to end the war that the United States and Israel launched on February 28.
The Strait of Hormuz sits between Iran and Oman and is one of the world's most important oil shipping routes, used daily by tankers carrying crude from Gulf producers to global markets.
Collapsed memorandum
Washington and Tehran signed a memorandum of understanding on June 17, but hostilities in the Middle East resumed shortly afterward. That prompted Iran to block the strategic trade route, leading Trump to reimpose a naval blockade off the Iranian coast.
