Iran to unveil new restricted zone in Gulf as strikes on shipping push oil prices higher

Iran plans to announce a new restricted zone in the Gulf within the coming days, along with maps detailing a new shipping corridor through the Strait of Hormuz, officials said Monday, as a weekend exchange of strikes on commercial vessels pushed oil prices higher and deepened uncertainty over the future of regional shipping.

Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, said in an interview with state television on Sunday that the new restricted zone would begin at the point where the American blockade of Iranian oil currently starts and extend into surrounding areas of the Gulf. He offered few specifics about how the zone would function but said any vessel that entered it would be added to a sanctions list. He added that maps outlining passage routes through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical waterway that has largely remained closed to tanker traffic in recent months, would also be finalized soon.

Rezaei said the routes for a new international corridor running through Iranian and Omani waters, which Iran would manage, had already been agreed upon and were expected to be formally signed in the coming days. He said Iran would only commit to keeping the Strait of Hormuz open once the United States halted what he described as sabotage, threats and attacks against Iranian interests.

Six months after strikes carried out by the United States and Israel against Iran triggered the current war, the conflict appears to have settled into a stalemate. A preliminary ceasefire reached in June has since collapsed, and diplomatic efforts to revive the peace process have made little headway. Military activity slowed for much of August but resumed in recent days, with both sides again trading strikes. United States Central Command said American forces struck three Iranian oil tankers on Saturday, including one near Kharg Island, Iran’s primary oil export hub, in response to earlier attacks by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on American warships operating in the region.

Iran has continued to demonstrate its ability to strike American interests in neighboring countries and to disrupt oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz, a waterway that carried roughly a fifth of the world’s oil supply before the conflict began. Shipping data released Monday showed that an average of just 10 commodity vessels passed through the strait each day over the past ten days, the lowest volume recorded since May. The slowdown helped extend gains in oil markets from the previous week, with Brent crude trading roughly 0.8 percent higher, above 97 dollars a barrel.

Facing mounting economic strain from American sanctions, Iranian officials have said they intend to intensify efforts to counter the effects of the blockade. Still, three senior Iranian sources said the American campaign to restrict Iran’s oil exports and close off avenues for sanctions evasion has become increasingly difficult for Tehran to manage. Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf said Sunday that Washington needed to recognize that the dynamics of the conflict had shifted, warning in a speech shared on his Telegram channel that any future attack on Iranian interests or security would be met with a faster, heavier and more damaging response.

Qalibaf said that alongside the military confrontation, Iran was now fighting an equally important battle over economic production and everyday livelihoods, pointing to volatile currency swings, rising inflation, unemployment and difficulties in market management as pressing concerns. He said the Iranian public could endure hardship but would not tolerate mismanagement or inaction, and he called on the government to respond quickly to these challenges. Separately, Iran’s Economy Minister Ali Madanizadeh said Tehran would answer American economic pressure through internal reforms rather than a change in policy direction, rejecting the idea that sanctions could alter the decisions made by the Iranian government and public. He said responsibility for reforming Iran’s economy rested with its own government and people rather than with American financial authorities.

Iran remains the third largest oil producer within the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and exported roughly 90 percent of its crude through the Kharg Island terminal before the war began. Flows through that hub have been significantly disrupted since the United States imposed a blockade on Iranian oil exports in mid April. American Central Command said Sunday that it had redirected 92 commercial vessels, disabled three and boarded two others as part of efforts to enforce strict compliance with the blockade. Late last month, President Donald Trump posted a brief message on social media accompanied by an artificial intelligence generated video depicting Kharg Island being destroyed, prompting Iranian officials to vow a forceful response should the island actually come under attack. Iran’s Oil Minister Mohsen Paknejad said in a state television interview that the island had already been struck roughly 550 times in recent months but had continued operating throughout.

Iran’s efforts to restrict passage through the Strait of Hormuz have contributed to rising fuel prices in the United States, a trend that has weighed on Trump’s approval ratings ahead of congressional elections in November that will determine control of both chambers. United States Energy Secretary Chris Wright, however, said oil continues to move through the waterway in significant volumes, noting that transits currently average more than 9 million barrels a day and that, when combined with pipeline routes bypassing the strait entirely, overall flows remain at roughly two thirds or more of pre conflict levels. He said Iran continues to cause disruptions but that the United States Navy has largely succeeded in maintaining the flow of oil through the region despite ongoing tensions.