Sources: US demands guarantees from Iran

TT-AP

Published 2026-07-10 23:42

          

          People wade in the waters of the Strait of Hormuz with cargo ships at anchor in the background.                 File photo Photo: Amirhosein Khorgooi /AP/TT
 

The US is demanding that Iran make a public statement that the Strait of Hormuz is open and that no further attacks on ships in the strait will occur, senior officials told the AP anonymously.

According to officials in the US administration, there is also an internal power struggle in Tehran that has made it difficult to reach and maintain an agreement with Iran.

A hardline, uncompromising faction within the Iranian power elite that is trying to sabotage the ceasefire is behind the Iranian attacks on three merchant ships this week, the sources say. The power struggle in Tehran is said to have begun after the US and Israel attacked Iran and killed the country's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The sources also say that US President Donald Trump will give US negotiators a limited time to reach an agreement with Iran, but they stress that the president has a range of options if talks fail.

But Iran's UN ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani told reporters outside the UN building in New York that all activities in the Strait of Hormuz are "directed solely by Iran."

Iran has previously said that the Strait of Hormuz must be under Iranian control and that ships wishing to pass through the strait must pay fees to Tehran.