Iran’s state-run Fars News Agency on Monday cited a “knowledgeable source” who said the U.S.-Iran peace deal “includes U.S. acceptance, for the first time, of Iran’s right to collect fees for maritime services” in the Strait of Hormuz.
According to the source, “explicit emphasis on Iranian-Omani sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz” was added to the deal during “the final moments of the negotiations.”
These final revisions to the deal supposedly stated that “future administration of maritime services in the Strait of Hormuz” will be “determined” by Iran and Oman, which lies on the opposite side of the strait.
The source told Fars that these revisions to the deal mean “the United States has effective accepted Iran’s right to collect related service fees,” after a 60-period of toll-free travel through the strait has elapsed.
“This principle is repeated elsewhere in the text. Iran will accept the passage of ships without charge only for 60 days. This means the United States has accepted the principle of collecting fees, while securing only a 60-day exemption from Iran,” the source said.
The Fars report said that Iran was concocting some mixture of “safety, navigation, environmental, and insurance services” as a pretext for extorting tolls from the huge volume of shipping that normally passes through the Strait of Hormuz, and has already secured support from Oman’s government for its scheme.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei also said on Monday that Iran will begin charging a “maritime service fee” from ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz.
“We have always maintained that we do not seek to collect transit tolls, but fees for navigation services, environmental protection, ship insurance and other necessary services will be charged,” he said, echoing the language used by Fars’ unnamed source.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on Friday that Tehran has “made a firm decision that the administration of the strategic waterway would no longer be the same as before the war.”
Araghchi said Iran would be charging “fees for services provided to ships” – services Iran has supposedly been providing all along, for free. He said a joint statement from Iran and Oman about these fees would be released soon.
These statements directly contradicted President Donald Trump’s assurances on Sunday that the Strait of Hormuz would be “permanently toll-free” as a result of his deal with Iran.
Vice President JD Vance told CNBC on Monday that he expected the Strait of Hormuz to be reopened without tolls for the “long term,” but the details have not been settled yet.
“Our expectation is that the strait is going to be opened in a toll-free way for the long term, and that’s the sort of thing that we’re going to figure out in these technical negotiations,” Vance said.
“There are a lot of very important details to figure out. We’re actually going to sit at the table and discuss together and figure out a path forward on these details,” he added.
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