The Iranian authorities will participate next Monday in Oman in a meeting with several countries of the Persian Gulf and Iraq, in which the progress of the talks held with Muscat to establish safe routes in the Strait of Hormuz will be examined, in a context of growing tension between Tehran and Washington in the region.
The spokesman for the Iranian Foreign Ministry, Esmail Baqaei, explained that delegations from Iraq and "other riparian states" of the Gulf will join the meeting on Monday, without clarifying which countries among the other five –Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates– are expected to attend.
"In addition to other regional issues, the results of the negotiations between Iran and Oman on the establishment of safe routes for commercial navigation in the Strait of Hormuz will also be discussed," he stated before the media.
Baqaei emphasized that the meeting represents "an important advance" to strengthen "trust" among the powers in the area and expressed his hope that it "paves the way for greater understanding" among them, "far from the destructive and divisive interventions of actors outside the region."
The spokesman also recalled that the understanding reached between Tehran and Muscat provides for "temporary" routes for maritime transit through this strategic passage.
At the same time, he insisted that the Iranian government remains "committed to efforts to ensure the security of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz," something that, he warned, will not be possible "as long as aggressive actions and illegal interventions by the United States continue, including naval blockade and economic warfare."