Iran said it has handed the United States a "seven-day plan" for reopening the Strait of Hormuz, and that shipping could resume within a week if its conditions are met. U.S. President Donald Trump, however, has rejected the Iranian proposal and is weighing a resumption of bombing after the November midterm elections, according to officials.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told reporters at United Nations headquarters in New York on the 25th that "Iran has conveyed a specific seven-day plan to the U.S. side through Qatar," according to The Times of Israel. "If the necessary conditions are met, the strait can reopen within seven days and normal navigation can be restored," he said. "The choice now rests with the United States. Iran does not accept coercion, threats or blackmail, and will not give up its sovereign rights under pressure."
Asked when he expected a response to the plan, Araghchi said that "if the United States accepts this plan tomorrow, the seven days would begin" immediately. "There are specific steps the United States must take," he said. "We believe these steps can be taken within four to five days." He added: "So on the sixth day the strait would open, and on the seventh day talks with the United States on mutually agreed topics would finally begin."
Araghchi stressed that "the steps the United States must take are nothing new," saying they "are all already contained in the memorandum of understanding on ending the war, and are already covered by U.S. commitments, so there is no difficulty in carrying them out."
Washington and Tehran signed a memorandum of understanding in June to end the war and entered follow-up negotiations, but the deal faltered at the implementation stage and effectively collapsed. The memorandum included easing sanctions on Iran, unfreezing Iranian assets and halting military operations on all fronts, including Lebanon.
"Trump Skeptical of Iran Talks" — Bombing Possible After Midterms
The United States, however, has not accepted Iran's demands and is weighing air strikes, according to officials.
The Wall Street Journal reported on the 25th, citing U.S. officials, that Trump told aides he was skeptical Iran would accept Washington's demands and said a resumption of bombing was likely.
Publicly, Trump has argued that Iran will come to seek a deal after the midterm elections that would dismantle its nuclear program. Privately, officials said, he views the chances of Iran accepting U.S. demands as low.
The scale of the strikes under consideration has not been confirmed. Officials said Trump is cautious about resuming large-scale combat because the United States needs to conserve dwindling munitions for other contingencies. They added that his judgment could shift depending on how the conflict unfolds and on the midterm results.
The Journal reported that Trump has alternated between carrots and sticks in the seven-month-old conflict, pursuing diplomacy while ordering air strikes and tightening sanctions. Each time talks stalled he signaled a major attack and carried some of them out, the paper said, though he pulled back from his most extreme threats, including a vow to wipe out Iranian civilization.
Arab mediators said Iranian diplomats have floated several proposals for ending the war amid deepening economic hardship. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, by contrast, is said to have no intention of reviewing a new agreement and to be preparing for a prolonged war.
Meanwhile, the U.S. military is seizing tankers loaded with Iranian crude and moving them toward the United States, according to reports. Bloomberg reported on the 25th that the tankers Tiffany and Majestic X, both carrying Iranian crude, were tracked sailing along the Brazilian coast over the past week.
The two vessels were seized by U.S. forces in April during Washington's naval blockade of Iran and have since changed course repeatedly. Shipping data analytics firm TankerTrackers.com said their recent tracks suggest the ships are likely headed for the United States.
The tanker Lenore, seized by U.S. forces in the Indian Ocean in June, was also spotted rounding the Cape of Good Hope and sailing west across the Atlantic, Bloomberg said. The news agency estimated that the combined cargo aboard the Tiffany, Majestic X and Lenore could be worth as much as $600 million.
Homeland Security Investigations said on X, formerly Twitter, after the April seizures that U.S. investigators were executing federal warrants to seize sanctioned tankers and about 4 million barrels of Iranian crude they carried. Trump also referred to the Navy seizures at an event in Florida on May 1, saying: "We're like pirates. We took the ships and we seized the cargo and all the oil."
