Pakistan hosts the first round of face-to-face talks between the US and Iran in 47 years in April; the talks end without a breakthrough, but also without a breakdown
US, Iran hold high-level talks in Switzerland on June 20 after signingpreliminary agreement to end the war; hold talks in Doha on July 1, with mediators citing “positive progress”
US launches strikes on Iran on July 8 in response to attacks on ships in Hormuz, Tehran retaliates as strait heats up again
The governor of Iran’s Bushehr province says 60 million cubic metres of gas production from the South Pars gas field, which was lost following US-Israeli attacks, has been restored after the reconstruction of damaged facilities, according to Press TV.
The chief executive of Saudi Arabia’s state oil firm said that attacks by Yemen’s Houthi rebels had no real effect on the oil giant’s production, AFP reports.
Strikes by the Iran-backed group had “no material impact on our capabilities”, Aramco president and CEO Amin H. Nasser said during a call with reporters, adding that they included Houthi attacks in July which targeted the company’s operations on the Red Sea coast and elsewhere.
Iran defends its borders but does not seek an expansion of war, President Masoud Pezeshkian has said, AFP reports, citing state media.
“We must work to forge a society that offers the enemy no temptation to interfere, no opening to infiltrate, and no means to divide or dismantle us,” the president was quoted as saying by IRNA.
While US President Donald Trump said that talks with Iran were underway a day earlier, Tehran has denied that any negotiations were planned.
Iran was prepared to launch strikes on three sites in Ukraine before scrapping the operation after an “apology” from Kyiv, according to a top military adviser to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
Andolu Agency reports that in an interview with Iranian state television, Mohsen Rezaei said Iran’s armed forces had completed preparations for the strikes before the operation was called off.
Rezaei also warned that Iran would not allow any maritime route through the Strait of Hormuz outside Iran’s designated route, saying any hostile naval vessel attempting to use an “illegal route” would be targeted.
He also said that Iran had inflicted heavy losses on US forces during the recent 17-day conflict, adding that Iranian missile and drone attacks had thwarted Washington’s military objectives.
The remarks came after Iran accused Ukraine on July 25 of attacking an Iranian commercial vessel in the Caspian Sea, killing one crew member.
A cargo vessel was struck by an “unknown projectile” in the Strait of Hormuz off the coast of Oman, a British maritime agency has said, without giving specifics on damage or injuries, AFP reports.
The vessel, which has not been named, reported being “hit by an unknown projectile” and authorities were investigating, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) said, adding the incident occurred 20 nautical miles (37 kilometres) northeast of Al Khasab, Oman.
Shipping traffic at the key Gulf waterways of Bab el-Mandeb and Strait of Hormuz held largely unchanged at the start of the week, shipping data showed, as the progress of talks between the United States and Iran remained ambiguous, Reuters reports.
Twenty vessels 12 tankers and eight bulk carriers passed through the Bab el-Mandeb strait on Monday, Kpler shipping data showed, steady from the previous day.
Of these 20 crossings, there were a total of 12 exits and eight entries, mostly with their transponders on.
US President Donald Trump says major oil companies are making “too much money” due to high prices stemming from the crude shortage caused by the Iran war, AFP reports.
“I don’t like it. They’re making too much money, okay? Based on a shortage, they’re making too much money,” Trump tells journalists at the White House.
Asked if Iran would be willing to return to fully free navigation through the Strait of Hormuz, US President Donald Trump has insisted that Iran will not charge vessels passing through the waterway.
“I’m not going to let them charge,” he tells reporters. “If anybody’s going to charge, we’re going to charge, we have total control.
“We’re not talking about charging at all,” Trump adds.
US President Donald Trump has said the Iran talks will “go quickly” and that the Strait of Hormuz will be open by tomorrow.
“It’s not very complex. We’re talking about the opening of the Strait [of Hormuz] and having it open, literally, by tomorrow, completely open. And that’s phase one,” he tells reporters in the Oval Office.
“Phase two is we’ll then talk about the nuclear capacity … basically the denuclearisation of Iran,” he adds, noting that it “has to happen”.
Trump adds that negotiating denuclearisation will “take a little while”.
Addressing reporters in the Oval Office, US President Donald Trump says, “This is the last chance for them to sign a good document,” referring to Iran.
US President Donald Trump has said talks with Iran are “going on right now”.
“We have many talks … they deny it. But they’re not denying it now,” Trump tells reporters at the Oval Office. “When they’re talking, they don’t like saying that we’re talking.
“The talks are going along. We were to hit them very hard yesterday … and they called … Iran did not want to be hit. They said ‘we want to talk’,” he says of Iran, adding that he received calls from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.
US President Donald Trump has said that the conflict in Iran is “working out very well”, as he signs executive orders in the Oval Office in the White House.
US Central Command (Centcom) says that as part of the US naval blockade on Iran, American forces have redirected 44 commercial vessels, disabled two and boarded two others.
During a phone call, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has spoken to his Omani counterpart, Badr AlBusaidi, and discussed the latest regional developments, Al Jazeera reports citing a Telegram post by Araghchi.
Oman and Iran have been negotiating over a new maritime route through the Strait of Hormuz, which borders both of their territorial waters.
Mohammad Karami, ground forces commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), says that in northwestern Iran, fighters are standing ready for any “miscalculation by extra-regional enemies or terrorist groups”, Al Jazeera reports.
In a post on X, the commander says fighters of the Hamzeh Seyyed al-Shohada Headquarters, who are backed with intelligence, “operational readiness, and leveraging faith, technology, and modern sciences, are prepared to deliver a decisive response to any threat”.
Oil prices have further slid on hopes of a peace deal between the US and Iran, according to AFP.
As of 1540 GMT (8:40pm PKT), West Texas Intermediate is down 6.1 per cent at $79.5 per barrel, while Brent North Sea Crude is down 4.7pc at $83.84 per barrel.
US President Donald Trump has blasted Iranian leadership as “unbelievably duplicitous” after Tehran announced that there are no talks with Washington.
“They ask for a meeting, some would say ‘beg”, talks begin, with more scheduled in the immediate future, and they say, openly and proudly, that they’re not having any discussions, that nothing is being talked about, and they’re only dealing with ‘Oman’,” he writes on Truth Social.
Trump also reiterates that the Strait of Hormuz is under American control, not Iranian, due to the US’ naval blockade and military presence in the region.
“Nothing gets through to Iran, unless we want it to, and nothing will get through, unless a deal, or total surrender, is accomplished,” he adds. “Whether Iran wants to admit it or not, we are, in fact, talking of a solution to a problem that they have caused, for decades.”
United States Central Command (Centcom) says it has helped more than 1,000 ships cross the Strait of Hormuz since early May.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, a spokesperson adds that Centcom’s forces remain on high alert and are ready to support commercial ships wishing to cross the strategic waterway, through which about 20 per cent of the world’s oil passes in peacetime.
In a phone conversation, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar invites Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi to visit Pakistan at his earliest convenience, FO has said in a post on X.
Dar and Araghchi have also “exchanged views on regional and international developments, including the deteriorating situation in Occupied East Jerusalem”.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan and his Kuwaiti counterpart, Jarrah Jaber Al Ahmad Al Sabah, have discussed the latest developments, Al Jazeera reports citing Turkish diplomatic sources.
No further details of the phone call have been provided.
