A U.S. official said Friday that Iran and Oman were making progress toward an agreement that could soon reopen the Strait of Hormuz and restore oil shipments disrupted by the five-month-old U.S. war with Iran.
The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said Washington expected the two countries, which border the strategic waterway, to reach an agreement soon that would allow normal oil traffic to resume.
An agreement between Iran and Oman on control of the strait is considered a key step toward a broader peace deal.
"There is progress between Oman and Iran on the strait, and we expect a deal soon," a U.S. official told Reuters on Friday. "Once the deal is announced to restore commercial shipping without impediments, the United States will lift the blockade of Iranian ports."
"As always, U.S. actions will continue to be performance-based and tied to Iran's implementation of its commitments," the official said.
Before the U.S. and Israel launched the war on Iran on Feb. 28, about one out of every five barrels of oil consumed worldwide transited the strait. But Iran has used the hostilities to justify charging a toll on oil tankers and firing on ships that attempt to cross the strait without permission.
The disruption in oil shipments has caused energy prices to surge and fueled inflation.
In recent weeks, the Trump administration has repeatedly signaled that a deal to reopen the strait could be close, only for Iran to deny that talks were underway. It was unclear whether the latest flurry of negotiations would yield a more lasting arrangement.
Iranian strikes on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz have been coupled with increased attacks by its Yemen-based allies, the Houthis, who have targeted ships at another oil chokepoint on the other side of the Arabian Peninsula, between the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.
Abu Dhabi National Oil Co., one of the world's largest energy producers, said Friday that 15 of its vessels had been struck in what it called unprovoked attacks while transiting the Strait of Hormuz since the start of the conflict. The attacks have killed one crew member and wounded 20 others, it said.
Alarmed at a regional conflagration that has brought Iranian missile fire onto Gulf oil exporters, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Türkiye signed a joint defense agreement in Mecca on Friday.
The pact among three U.S. allies with majority Sunni Muslim populations is intended to strengthen collective deterrence against aggression. It stipulates that an armed attack against any of the three would be regarded as an attack on all, the countries said in a statement.
Türkiye said the agreement was not aimed at any specific country and was purely defensive. But it comes at a time of heightened tensions with Shiite-majority Iran.
Meanwhile, the U.S. has been trying to broker an end to fighting on another front of the war between Israel and the Iranian-backed Shiite group Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.
A Lebanese official said Friday that Lebanon and Israel had agreed on a shortlist of countries that could send troops to verify the disarmament of Hezbollah under a U.S.-brokered agreement. The United States would select countries from the list.
Washington and Tehran have not engaged in direct high-level talks since U.S. Vice President JD Vance met Iranian officials in Switzerland in June, shortly after the two sides reached a ceasefire agreement.
That short-lived June 17 memorandum of understanding established terms for resuming oil shipments through the Strait of Hormuz and led to a ceasefire.
Amid internal opposition to the deal in the U.S. and Iran, hostilities resumed July 7, only to be put on hold again. The U.S. military's Central Command has not reported any strikes on Iran since July 29.
Analysts have said signs of fissures between Iran's civilian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, and the other power centers in Iran, notably Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, may be complicating peace efforts.
In an interview with state television broadcast Friday, Pezeshkian defended his government's policies against hardliners who have opposed negotiations with the United States. He said most senior military commanders supported talks toward a deal to stop the fighting.
"America's biggest enemy is China, why don't they fight? China is doing its own thing and is getting stronger day by day. When we can get our rights through dialogue, why not do it?" he said.
