ports

Reports of Iranian gunboats opening fire on a tanker in strait, after Tehran said it is closing the waterway until the US lifts the blockade of its ports.

Iran says it has closed the Strait of Hormuz again, calling the decision a response to a continued blockade of its ports by the United States.

The Iranian military on Saturday said control of the strategic waterway, through which 20 percent of the global oil flows, has “returned to its previous state”, with reports saying Iranian gunboats fired at a merchant vessel as it attempted to ‌cross.

The closure of the strait came hours after it was reopened, with more than a dozen commercial ships passing through the waterway, after a US-mediated 10-day ceasefire deal was reached between Israel and Lebanon.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) on Saturday said in a statement, cited by the Iranian media, that the ongoing US blockade of Iranian ports represented “acts of piracy and maritime theft”, adding that the control over Hormuz is “under the strict management and control of the armed forces”.

“Until the US restores full freedom of navigation for vessels travelling from Iran to their destinations and back, the status of the Strait of Hormuz will remain tightly controlled and in its previous condition,” it said.

By 10:30 GMT on Saturday, no fewer than eight oil and gas tankers had crossed the strait, but at least as many ships appeared to have turned back, having begun to exit the Gulf, the AFP news agency reported.

The toing and froing over the strait cast doubt on US President Donald Trump’s optimism the day before, that a peace deal to end the US-Israel war on Iran was “very close”.

Trump had celebrated the reopening of the strait on Friday, but warned the US attacks would resume until Iran agreed to a deal, which included its nuclear programme.

“Maybe I won’t extend it,” Trump told reporters on board Air Force One about the temporary ceasefire agreement in place. “So you’ll have a blockade, and unfortunately we’ll have to start dropping bombs again.”

Asked whether a potential deal could be made in this short timeframe, Trump said: “I think it’s going to happen.”

But Iran says no date has been agreed for another round of peace talks, accusing the US of “betraying” diplomacy in all negotiations.

The conflicting and changing reports about the strait and how much freedom ships have to transit through it have deterred many vessels from crossing, according to John-Paul Rodrigue, a maritime shipping specialist at Texas A&M University.

“Ships have been attempting transit since the announcement, but it looks like many of them are heading back because the situation is unclear,” Rodrigue told Al Jazeera. “There is contradictory information being issued by all parties.”

Reporting from Tehran, Al Jazeera’s Tohid Asadi said “uncertainty is the name of the game” as far as the Strait of Hormuz is concerned.

“Iran is looking for a comprehensive end to the war across the region, security assurances, sanctions relief, the unfreezing of frozen assets, regional relations – and on top of all of that – the nuclear dossier and Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium,” he said.

“But right now, uncertainty is the name of the game. The fragile situation makes it hard to talk about the possibility of successful negotiations down the road.”

April 13 (UPI) — The U.S. military said it will begin blocking all ships from leaving or entering Iran’s ports on Monday morning in line with a maritime blockade ordered by U.S. President Donald Trump to cut off Iranian oil exports.

U.S. Central Command said in a news release Sunday that the blockade would be enforced equitably against vessels of all nations sailing to or from Iranian ports, including all those on the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman, but stressed vessels serving ports in neighboring countries would be left alone.

“CENTCOM forces will not impede freedom of navigation for vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz to and from non-Iranian ports,” said the news release, which instructs the masters of all ships to monitor “Notice to Mariners” broadcasts and make radio contact with U.S. naval forces on bridge-to-bridge channels in Gulf of Oman and Strait of Hormuz approaches.

The blockade would effectively cut off Iran’s international trade by preventing it from importing or exporting anything by sea, in particular its energy exports on which it is reliant for hard currency.

Further details would be communicated in a formal notice that would be provided to commercial ships and operators prior to the start of the blockade, due to come into force at 10 a.m. EDT, CENTCOM said.

The statement clarified comments by Trump early Sunday in which he appeared to announce a total blockade of the Strait of Hormuz in response to the failure of peace talks in Pakistan at the weekend.

Trump had said the U.S. Navy “will begin the process of BLOCKADING any and all Ships trying to enter, or leave, the Strait of Hormuz.”

On Saturday, CENTCOM announced that the U.S. Navy guided-missile destroyers USS Frank E. Peterson USS Michael Murphy had transited the Strait of Hormuz and operated in the Persian Gulf, preparatory to clearing Iranian mines and reopening the shipping route to commercial vessels.

Tehran responded to the development with unspecified threats against the ports of its neighbors and raised the specter of widening the conflict to the Red Sea, the other sea passage in the region that is critical to the global economy.

“Security in the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman is either for everyone or for NO ONE. If Iran’s ports are threatened, NO PORT in the region will be safe,” the Iranian military’s central command said in a statement carried by state-run broadcaster IRIB.

“Naval blockade of Iran? Bab al-mandeb Coming soon?!,” IRIB said earlier in a post referencing the narrow strait at the southern entrance to the Red Sea, which leads to the Suez Canal, where Iran-backed Houthi rebels attacked around 100 commercial ships November 2023 through September 2025.

Oil prices rose in response to the developments while stock markets retreated.

The benchmark Brent crude and West Texas Intermediate both climbed back above $100 a barrel with the Brent contract for June delivery changing hands at $102.31 per barrel in mid-morning trade in London while the WTI contract for May was trading at $104.44.

The FTSE 100 in London was down 0.33%, the DAX in Frankfurt fell almost 1.2% and France’s CAC 40 was off by almost 1%.

Former U.S. special envoy to the region David Satterfield expressed concerns over the blockade, warning that if shipping continued to be affected current supply disruption would widen beyond oil, with serious implications for Gulf countries’ exports of many other critical materials from aluminum and helium to polymers and fertilizer feed stocks.

“The Gulf is a critical global supply point, far beyond hydrocarbons — and the impact if this goes on for several more weeks is going to become quite profound, beyond just the cost of petrol and diesel at the pump,” Satterfield told the BBC.

Iran’s military has called US blockade plans in the Strait of Hormuz an “act of piracy”, warning that the ports in the Gulf and Seas of Oman are “either for everyone or for no one”. Al Jazeera’s Tohid Asadi is in Tehran.

Vessels will still be able to transit Strait of Hormuz to and from non-Iranian ports, says CENTCOM; Iran warns any approaching military vessels will be breaching ceasefire.

The United States military has announced it will begin blockading all Iranian ports on Monday, its latest move to exert pressure on Tehran after marathon peace talks in Pakistan concluded without a deal.

In a statement on Sunday evening, US Central Command (CENTCOM) said the blockade would apply to “all maritime traffic entering and exiting Iranian ports” from 10am Eastern Time (14:00 GMT) on April 13. That includes “vessels of all nations entering or departing Iranian ports and coastal areas”, including those on the Gulf and the Gulf of Oman.

However, US forces “will not impede freedom of ⁠navigation for vessels transiting the Strait ⁠of Hormuz to and ⁠from non-Iranian ports,” CENTCOM said, in an apparent scaling back from President Donald Trump’s earlier threat to blockade the entire strait and pursue ships paying tolls to Iran.

“There are a lot of questions here,” said Al Jazeera’s Heidi Zhou-Castro from Washington, DC, pointing to “conflicting information” coming out of the US side.

“Trump said the blockade would target any and all ships trying to enter or leave the Strait of Hormuz. But CENTCOM is saying this would only target ships going to or from Iranian ports.”

The price of US crude oil jumped 8 percent to $104.24 a barrel after the US blockade threat. Brent crude oil, the international standard, increased 7 percent to $102.29.

Iran has essentially taken control over the Strait of Hormuz, a vital chokepoint for the global energy market, since the US and Israel launched a war against the country on February 28. Traffic through the waterway has since slowed to a trickle, nearly paralysing about one-fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas shipments.

Iran has continued to move its own vessels through the strait, while allowing limited passage of ships from other countries. Iranian officials have discussed setting up a toll system after the fighting ends.

In a statement responding to Trump’s blockade threat, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said any approaching military vessels would be in breach of a US-Iran ceasefire – meant to be in effect until April 22 – and “will be dealt with severely”.

The US-declared blockade appears to be triggered by the failure of the talks in Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, raising fears of renewed fighting.

Iranian officials blamed the US side for failing to reach a deal, with Minister of Foreign Affairs Abbas Araghchi saying US negotiators shifted the “goalposts” and obstructed efforts when a memorandum of understanding was “just inches away”.

Zohreh Kharazmi, an associate professor at the University of Tehran, said the US “is not in a position to dictate” to Iranians how to behave, or “to choose which vessels may pass”.

“If this blockade becomes a contest between the resilience of the Islamic Republic and the resilience of global markets, it will not take long to see who is losing,” she said, adding that Iran “is ready for a prolonged war”.

“Technically, they [the US] cannot control the situation. With Hollywood-style strategies, they cannot prevail in this battleground.”

Mukalla, Yemen – A reported decision to impose thousands of dollars in fees on shipping headed for Yemen has experts worried that the price of imported goods and food will increase in the war-torn country, as it starts to feel the economic impact of the United States and Israel’s conflict with Iran.

Local traders and officials have said that international shipping companies informed importers earlier this month of the imposition of new fees of about $3,000 on each container bound for Yemen, described as “war risk” fees. The surprise move prompted government officials to scramble to assess and address its potential repercussions.

Because Yemen imports nearly 90 percent of its food and other essential commodities, economists and humanitarian organisations warn that the rise in shipping and insurance costs could quickly translate into higher prices for fuel, food and other goods, further worsening an already dire humanitarian situation.

Mohsen al-Amri, transport minister in Yemen’s internationally-recognised government based in the southern city of Aden, said he had instructed that the fees not be paid by ships already docked at Yemeni ports or those bound for the country, insisting that the ports remain safe.

“Our ports are far from the areas of geopolitical tension in the Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz, making the imposition of ‘risk’ fees on shipments to these relatively safe areas unjustified from both operational and security perspectives,” he said in a social media post last week.

Al Jazeera has reached out to shipping companies to confirm details of the fee, but has yet to receive responses.

For more than a decade, Yemen has been gripped by a bloody war between the Saudi-backed government, based in Aden, and the Iran-aligned Houthi movement, which controls the capital, Sanaa. The conflict has killed and wounded thousands of people and displaced millions, creating what the United Nations once described as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. Hostilities have significantly declined since April 2022, when the warring parties agreed to a temporary United Nations-brokered truce.

‘High-risk’

Abdulrab al-Khulaqui, deputy chairman of the Yemen Gulf of Aden Ports Corporation, said Yemeni ports have long been classified as high-risk, prompting shipping companies to impose war-risk surcharges. These can reach about $500 per each 20-foot container and $1,000 per each 40-foot container, on top of regular shipping costs.

Al-Khulaqui said that the $3,000 fee now being demanded was “very high and unusual”, but was justified by shipping companies because they regard Yemeni ports as unsafe, despite their distance from Iran.

Although the Houthis are allied to Iran and previously attacked shipping in the Red Sea following Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, the Yemeni group has yet to intervene in the US-Israel-Iran conflict. Other Yemeni parties are also not involved, making Yemen one of the few regional countries yet to see any violence related to the fighting.

In addition to barring local traders from paying the new charges, the Yemeni government is considering other measures to pressure shipping companies to cancel the fees, including threatening to stop vessels belonging to those companies from docking at Yemeni ports. Authorities may also allow traders to contact exporters directly in countries of origin to negotiate any additional charges.

The new surcharges come as the United Nations has again sounded the alarm over Yemen’s worsening humanitarian situation, saying nearly 65.4 percent of the population – about 23.1 million people – will require urgent humanitarian assistance and protection services this year. This marks an increase of roughly 3.5 million people compared with 2025.

“Yemen continues to face an escalating food security crisis entering 2026,” the World Food Program said in its February Yemen Food Security Update, released on March 5. “January data revealed that 63 percent of households nationwide are struggling to meet their minimum food needs, including 36 percent facing severe food deprivation.”

Bypassing Yemen’s ports

In addition to rising insurance fees on shipments to Yemen, the war in Iran and potential disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz could cut vital supply routes from regional hub ports such as Jebel Ali in the United Arab Emirates.

Mustafa Nasr, head of the Studies and Economic Media Center, told Al Jazeera that shipping companies may begin seeking alternative hub ports to deliver goods to Yemen, which could increase costs and cause delays.

“The closure of Jebel Ali port would force shipping lines to seek alternative ports that may be farther away and involve significantly higher transportation costs,” he said.

Nabil Abdullah Bin Aifan, manager of the government-run Maritime Affairs Authority in Hadramout province and a maritime researcher, said most goods arriving at Mukalla port – the province’s main seaport – are transported on wooden dhows from Dubai.

He said that if disruptions occur in the Strait of Hormuz, traders may turn to alternative regional hub ports such as Salalah in Oman or Jeddah in Saudi Arabia.

“Large ships come to Dubai to unload their containers, and traders then unload the goods from the containers and load them onto those primitive ships, which have no insurance,” Bin Aifan told Al Jazeera.

For now, wheat shipments from Ukraine and goods transported from China to Yemen may see price increases due to rising insurance costs, while products imported from Gulf countries could disappear from the market.

Shipping lines may also consider routing cargo through the Cape of Good Hope rather than the Gulf, Bin Aifan said.

“Even before the recent developments involving Iran, ports in our region were considered high risk. However, after the relative calm that followed the halt to Houthi attacks in the Red Sea, confidence gradually returned and ships began sailing back to the region. Now, the war has brought the problem back again,” he said.

All of this means that Yemenis, already struggling with poverty and hunger after years of war, will likely have to pay more for imported food and goods.

Abdullah al-Hadad, an English teacher from the city of Taiz with 40 years of experience in the profession, said that his monthly salary – less than $80 – is already not enough to cover his basic needs. Meat and fish have become luxuries for his family, and he still owes nearly one million Yemeni riyals (about $670) to a local grocery shop.

To make ends meet, he works additional jobs as a taxi driver and in a grocery store, while his children also work after school to help support the family and pay for medication for his 10-year-old son, who has autism.

“What I suffer from as a government employee is the extremely low salary, which does not even cover basic necessities such as bread, tea, salt and sugar,” al-Hadad told Al Jazeera.

“Other foods that are essential for a healthy diet, like meat or fish, have become a distant dream.”