Iran Issues Sweeping Demands to Reopen Strait of Hormuz, Derailing Oman Talks

Iran has thrown the fate of the Strait of Hormuz into deeper uncertainty after a senior national security official issued a broad list of conditions the United States must satisfy before the critical waterway reopens. Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr, secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, demanded that Washington lift its naval blockade and sanctions, withdraw military forces from around Iran, pay war reparations, release frozen Iranian assets, and cease attacks on Iran's regional allies — a sweeping set of preconditions that goes far beyond what any existing agreement contemplated.

The demands blindsided expectations that an Iran-Oman deal was imminent. Iran's foreign minister Abbas Araghchi acknowledged that the two countries were 'very close' to a bilateral agreement on managing the strait, but explicitly decoupled that deal from any actual reopening, saying resumption of traffic hinges on the U.S. compensating Iran for alleged violations of the June cease-fire brokered in Islamabad. That agreement — vague in its language — called for temporarily lifting oil sanctions and opening the strait, but collapsed after the U.S. backed a southern shipping route that skirted Oman's coast and avoided Iranian waters, prompting Iran to attack vessels using it and the U.S. to reimpose its naval blockade.

The economic stakes are severe. Ship crossings through the strait have collapsed from an average of 130 vessels per day before the conflict to just over a dozen daily in the past week, according to maritime data firm Kpler. Some ships are evading detection by switching off location transponders, making even that count an underestimate. The closure has rattled global energy markets and threatens to keep consumer prices elevated in the U.S. — a politically dangerous situation for Republicans heading into November's midterm elections.

Iran's IRGC spokesman Hossein Mohebbi made clear the Oman talks are essentially irrelevant to reopening: he said that decision rests entirely on U.S. acceptance of Iran's conditions, not on any bilateral maritime negotiation. Analysts see the hardline posturing as partly driven by domestic politics — both Araghchi and President Masoud Pezeshkian are under fire from Iranian hard-liners opposed to any compromise with Washington. Meanwhile, Iran continued attacking shipping in the strait; the UAE reported an Iranian strike on an Abu Dhabi National Oil Company tanker, one of at least 15 ADNOC vessels hit since the conflict began, resulting in one death and 20 crew injuries.

Vice President JD Vance, speaking on Fox News, portrayed the U.S. as still engaged in the talks and argued Washington holds decisive leverage because Iran is 'hurting in a big way.' He framed remaining issues as logistical — demining and Iranian guarantees against attacking commercial ships — without acknowledging Iran's expansive new demands or specifying what the U.S. might concede. Whether Vance was aware of Zolghadr's statement at the time of the interview was unclear.