US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Monday that a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz could be reached within days, with Rubio expressing hope that an agreement would be finalized “very shortly.”
“There’s been progress made in those talks, but not finality yet. We’re hoping that will happen very shortly,” Rubio told reporters at the State Department. Bessent went further, telling CNBC that a deal could be struck as early as Tuesday or Wednesday.
Under the emerging framework being negotiated with Iran and Oman, commercial ships would enter the Persian Gulf through a route controlled by Iran and exit through an Oman-controlled corridor. Service fees would be charged for providing security and preserving the maritime environment, according to two regional officials familiar with the talks.
Qatar confirmed that drafts of a potential US-Iran agreement are “being circulated” among the parties, signaling that negotiations have moved from exploratory discussions to concrete text. The deal would aim to restart commercial shipping through one of the world’s most critical energy chokepoints.
The proposed arrangement has drawn sharp criticism from analysts and some lawmakers who warn it would effectively cement Iranian control over what was an open international waterway before the war began. Rubio himself said last month that giving Iran control over the strait would create “a very dangerous precedent” for global maritime security.
Bessent said the potential deal sent oil prices plunging on Monday, with crude futures falling sharply on hopes that the months-long disruption to Gulf shipping could soon ease. The Strait of Hormuz normally handles roughly 20 million barrels of oil per day, and its near-total shutdown since the US-Israel war on Iran began in February has kept global energy markets in turmoil.
The diplomatic push comes as the US simultaneously advances a backup plan to reduce dependence on the strait. Washington is supporting a revived Iraq-Syria pipeline that would carry oil from Iraqi fields to Syria’s Mediterranean coast, bypassing Hormuz entirely. However, analysts have questioned whether the pipeline is viable given Iraq’s own dependence on Hormuz for its exports.
Sources: CNBC, Bloomberg, The Guardian
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