France and the UK are to co-host a summit this week to come up with a ’strictly defensive’ plan to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to civilian ships.
French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer have announced plans to organize a conference later this week to set up a “strictly defensive” mission to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to civilian shipping, free of tolls.
“This week the UK and France will co-host a summit to advance work on a coordinated, independent, multinational plan to safeguard international shipping when the conflict ends,” Starmer said in a post on X on April 13.
“The ongoing closure of the Strait of Hormuz is deeply damaging. Getting global shipping moving is vital to ease cost of living pressures.”
In a post on X on April 13, Macron said the plan was for a peaceful multinational mission aimed at “restoring freedom of navigation in the strait.”
“This strictly defensive mission, separate from the warring parties to the conflict, is intended to be deployed as soon as circumstances permit,” Macron said.
The U.S. Navy began a blockade of the strait at 10 a.m. ET on April 13, after peace talks with Iran, which took place in Pakistan over the weekend, ended without a deal.
“Effective immediately, the United States Navy, the Finest in the World, will begin the process of blockading any and all Ships trying to enter, or leave, the Strait of Hormuz,” U.S. President Donald Trump said in a Truth Social post on April 12.
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) later clarified that the blockade would apply specifically to vessels entering or exiting Iranian ports.
“CENTCOM forces will not impede freedom of navigation for vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz to and from non-Iranian ports,” it said in an X post.
In response, the Iranian military warned on April 13 that no port in the Persian Gulf or the Gulf of Oman would remain secure if the United States proceeded with a naval blockade of Iran’s ports.
In a post on X, Ebrahim Rezaei, a spokesman for the Iranian parliament’s National Security Commission, said the U.S. blockade was “more bluffing than reality,” according to a translation.
“It would be considered a military operation, and we will respond; it complicates the current situation he’s already in and further unsettles the market that’s furious about it,” Rezaei said, referring to Trump.
“And we might even reveal other cards we haven’t played in this game.”
