# Iran says maritime fees for Hormuz will start after 60-day talks
Iran has announced plans to introduce maritime fees for ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz after the end of a 60-day negotiation period tied to a memorandum of understanding with the United States.
The move adds a new layer of uncertainty to one of the world’s most important shipping corridors. According to the supplied report, Tehran said the fee system is meant to cover the cost of managing the waterway. The announcement came as the U.S. lifted its blockade of Iran and oil tankers began moving freely through the channel again.
Iran framed the development as a political and strategic success. In the account supplied from The Guardian, officials described the strait as being under Iranian control and said a European plan for a naval escort mission would not be welcome. That claim is part of a broader dispute over who gets to police traffic through the route and on what terms.
The timeline matters. The fees are not set to begin immediately; they are due only after the 60-day period that followed the memorandum of understanding. The report also says technical-level talks will continue at the Bürgenstock resort near Lake Lucerne, where negotiators are expected to discuss implementation details of the 14-clause agreement.
Those details include sanctions relief for Iran’s oil exports and measures intended to keep commercial traffic moving through Hormuz. At the same time, the Iranian chief negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said the strait needed to be managed and that such management would carry a cost.
Regional reaction was immediate. Saudi foreign minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud rejected the idea of a new arrangement, saying the strait had worked without incident before the conflict and arguing that traffic should return to the previous setup. The UAE also signaled that it would continue deepening ties with Israel after the war, while Iranian officials began working to repair relations with Gulf states.
The report also tied the dispute to wider diplomatic bargaining. A planned formal signing ceremony for the memorandum was cancelled, though the U.S. president and Iran’s president had already signed the document. Pakistan’s prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, was expected to play a mediator’s role before the ceremony was scrapped.
What is clear from the supplied evidence is that the shipping route has become a central lever in the broader U.S.-Iran deal. Tehran wants the waterway recognized as something that can be managed and monetized. Its critics, including Gulf officials, are warning that any novel arrangement risks replacing a route that already functioned under established practice.
For shipping companies, the practical question is whether the newly proposed fees will become another cost of doing business in one of the most strategically sensitive chokepoints in global trade.
