Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said Monday that Tehran has no active negotiations with Washington, even as global oil prices posted their steepest one-day decline since early April. Brent futures, the global benchmark, closed at $85.87 a barrel, down 11.3 percent, while US crude fell about 7 percent to $82.61, according to CNN, after President Donald Trump paused a strike campaign that had run nearly two weeks. Baghaei drew a sharp line around the one channel that remains open, calling talks with Oman on Strait of Hormuz shipping “useful negotiations regarding the management of shipping traffic” that are “unrelated to the United States.”
Behind that distinction sits a concrete proposal. A compromise now being negotiated centers on Iran running vessel transit through the Strait of Hormuz with fewer restrictions on ships, as both countries look to revive the interim ceasefire deal that broke down after Iran fired on tankers transiting the strait, according to an official cited by Fortune, who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.
Diplomats have avoided calling the current halt a ceasefire. The pause was framed as an effort to give peace talks “some space,” with Iran also holding off on regional strikes in recent days, according to CNBC, even as Tehran denied separate reports that it had accepted a ten-day truce.
Saudi Arabia, watching the pause from outside the US-Iran channel, has tied its own restraint to reciprocity. “Iran’s position remains ‘attack for attack’: if the attacks stop, Iran will also halt its operations,” a source told Reuters, according to the Jerusalem Post, which reported Riyadh and Washington had each submitted responses following a second consecutive night without new US strikes.
