The Iranian authorities have warned this Saturday that the Strait of Hormuz has ceased to be a free navigation corridor and that its situation has changed irreversibly since the beginning of the offensive launched on February 28 by the United States and Israel.
"The Strait of Hormuz has become a strategic advantage for Iran under the new security conditions and will never again have the status it had before," declared the spokesperson for the Presidency of the Iranian Parliament, Abbas Goudarzi, who this very week announced the beginning of legislative procedures to impose a navigation cost on ships transiting the strait, to be paid in the national currency, the rial.
In statements released by the semi-official Tasnim agency, Goudarzi emphasizes that "the management of this important maritime route is in the hands of the armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and no country will have the right to transit through it without Iran's permission, and Iran will defend this strategic position with all its military might."
In recent weeks, Tehran has only authorized in a very limited manner the passage of ships flagged or destined for states that have explicitly rejected the joint operation of the United States and Israel.
In this context, Turkey's Minister of Transport and Infrastructure, Abdulkadir Uraloglu, has stated in recent hours that two ships owned by Turkish shipowners have managed to cross the Strait of Hormuz for the first time since the outbreak of the conflict.
The parliamentary spokesperson has also stressed that Iran does not contemplate making concessions to Washington and that "the path of the Islamic Republic is neither compromise nor surrender, but resistance to consolidate Iran's position in the new world order."
A REGIONAL FUTURE THROUGH BILATERAL AGREEMENTS
Following these statements, the Parliament Speaker, Mohamad Baquer Qalifab, has indicated that Iran intends to leverage its control over the strait to promote a new regional security architecture based on "bilateral security agreements" with interested countries "without foreign interference", in allusion to the United States and Israel.
"The countries of the region can safeguard their interests through bilateral and multilateral security agreements, without foreign interference. It is necessary to eliminate the main causes of insecurity in the region and build security without the participation of the United States and Israel," he stated in an interview granted to the pan-Arab channel Al Jazeera.
"Iran considers it a priority to maintain sustainable security for the region, because it redounds to the interests of its countries in the face of this war imposed by Israel," he added.
THE BILATERAL NEGOTIATIONS LEAD TO AN INCREASE IN TRANSIT
In parallel, this week the highest volume of ship transit has been registered since the beginning of the war, even of vessels without evident ties to Iran or China, while different governments maintain conversations with Tehran to guarantee the passage of their ships.
According to Bloomberg, in the last day movements have been dominated by liquefied petroleum gas transport vessels, among them one destined for India and others related to Iranian interests.
In total, around 13 ships have crossed since Friday morning, about ten coming from the Persian Gulf and three that have entered from open sea, according to vessel tracking data collected by the agency. However, this figure remains very low when compared to pre-war levels.
Among the latest recorded passages also figure a French container ship and a Japanese-owned vessel, apparently the first of this type to cross the area since the start of the conflict.