IRAN’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has said it coordinated the transit of 26 vessels through the Strait of Hormuz in the past 24 hours, as talks between Washington and Tehran over the resumption of traffic through the narrow waterway remain stalled.
“Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz is being carried out with permission and in coordination with the IRGC Navy,” the statement carried by Iran’s state-affiliated ISNA news agency said on Wednesday.
Later on Wednesday, Iran’s Persian Gulf Strait Authority (PGSA) published a new map of Hormuz on X, marking a controlled maritime zone that vessels will not be able transit without its authorisation.
The authority said the zone stretches from Kuh-e Mubarak in Iran to south of Fujairah, in the United Arab Emirates, at the eastern entrance of the strait, and from the tip of Qeshm Island to Umm al-Quwain at the western entrance.
About a fifth of global energy exports used to pass through the strait before the beginning of the United States-Israel war on Iran on February 28, which prompted Tehran to blockade the waterway.
US President Donald Trump’s administration responded by imposing a blockade on Iranian ports, choking Iranian oil exports – the country’s key source of revenue.
The standoff has put huge strain on global energy markets as well as raising concerns over a looming humanitarian catastrophe.
On Wednesday, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) warned that the blockage could trigger a severe global food price crisis within six to 12 months, calling the disruption “the beginning of a systemic agrifood shock”.
The Rome-based agency said the disruption is no longer only a shipping or energy-market problem, warning that the shock is moving through global agrifood systems in stages.
“The shock is unfolding in stages: energy, fertilizer, seeds, lower yields, commodity price increases, then food inflation,” the FAO said.
On Wednesday, Trump spoke about “progress” made in negotiations with Iran. But he also threatened to resume military action if Iran does not agree to a deal.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi warned “return to war will feature many more surprises”. The IRGC also said that if Iran is attacked again, it would widen the conflict by extending fighting “this time” beyond the region.
Will Todman, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told Al Jazeera that the warring sides seem convinced that extending their respective blockades will earn them more leverage against the other.
“I think it’s very difficult to see something that will fundamentally change the calculation, because both sides seem to believe that the longer this goes on, the greater their leverage will be because the more their opponents will be suffering economically,” Todman said on Wednesday.