Iran demands Strait of Hormuz tolls as truce with US hangs in the balance
It comes after the US declared "capital V for victory" in Iran, as Washington's Defence Secretary hailed Donald Trump for "choosing peace" by agreeing to a ceasefire
Iran has warned any tankers travelling along the Strait of Hormuz without permission will be destroyed and demanded that vessels pay a toll to pass through the crucial shipping lane.
Listen to this article
Hours after agreeing a temporary ceasefire with the White House, Iran broadcast a message to oil tankers on the vital waterway, warning: “If any vessels try to transit without permission, [they] will be destroyed.”
The Iranian regime is reportedly demanding ships pay a massive toll to pass through the Strait - which transports around 20 per cent of the world’s oil.
According to the Financial Times, Iran wants $1 per barrel of oil, with the toll paid in cryptocurrency.
Read more: Trump's pressure campaign worked - Iran proved it
The reopening of the Strait of Hormuz is a crucial element of Donald Trump’s proposed ceasefire, but almost a day on from his announcement, ships are still not passing through.
“Iran needs to monitor what goes in and out of the strait to ensure these two weeks aren’t used for transferring weapons,' Hamid Hosseini, a spokesperson for Iran’s Oil, Gas and Petrochemical Products Exporters’ Union, told the Financial Times.
“Everything can pass through, but the procedure will take time for each vessel, and Iran is not in a rush,' he added.
“Once the email arrives and Iran completes its assessment, vessels are given a few seconds to pay in bitcoin, ensuring they can’t be traced or confiscated due to sanctions,” Hosseini told the outlet.
It comes after the US declared "capital V for victory" in Iran, as Washington's Defence Secretary hailed Donald Trump for "choosing peace" by agreeing to a ceasefire.
Pete Hegseth said the United States had achieved all of its goals in the war, hours after Trump announced a ceasefire with Iran despite threatening to destroy the entire country.
"Operation Epic Fury was a historic and overwhelming victory on the battlefield. A capital V military victory by any measure," Hegseth said.
He said that, prior to the announcement of Trump's ceasefire, the US launched a wave of more than 800 strikes that "finished completely destroying Iran's defence industrial base, a core pillar of our mission objective".
He added the country's command and control is "so decimated they can't really talk and coordinate, so they still may shoot here and there. But that would be very, very unwise."
He said Trump had the power to cripple Iran's entire economy in minutes, "but he chose mercy".
Hegseth's comments came shortly after Trump took to social media to say Iran has agreed to "many" of his 15 demands.
Writing on TruthSocial, he said: "The United States will work closely with Iran, which we have determined has gone through what will be a very productive Regime Change!
"There will be no enrichment of Uranium, and the United States will, working with Iran, dig up and remove all of the deeply buried (B-2 Bombers) Nuclear 'Dust.'
"It is now, and has been, under very exacting Satellite Surveillance (Space Force!). Nothing has been touched from the date of attack.
"We are, and will be, talking Tariff and Sanctions relief with Iran. Many of the 15 points have already been been agreed to."
The exact details of the ceasefire remain unknown, with both sides claiming the other has capitulated.
The deal came less than two hours before his deadline, where he had warned that “a whole civilisation will die” unless Tehran met his demands.
The agreement followed a request by Pakistan, which has been acting as a mediator in the conflict between the warring sides.
The Iranian regime said it had accepted a temporary truce but warned that its “hands remain upon the trigger”, while a White House official said Israel had also accepted the terms of the ceasefire agreement.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel backed Mr Trump’s suspension of strikes against Iran, but said any deal does not cover fighting against Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said he had invited Iranian and US officials to Islamabad for talks on Friday.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer welcomed the ceasefire agreement in the Middle East as he travels to the region to meet leaders of Gulf countries.
“I welcome the ceasefire agreement reached overnight, which will bring a moment of relief to the region and the world,” he said.
“Together with our partners we must do all we can to support and sustain this ceasefire, turn it into a lasting agreement and reopen the Strait of Hormuz.”
US Vice President JD Vance addressed the "tentative" agreement while speaking in Budapest, Hungary, on Wednesday.
He said: "This is a fragile truce, you have people who clearly want to come to the negotiating table and work with us to find a good deal and then you have people who are lying about even the fragile truce that we've already struck."
Vance said Trump had instructed the negotiating team to "go and work in good faith to come to an agreement".
"If the Iranians are willing in good faith to work with us, I think we can make an agreement," Vance said.
"If they're going to lie, if they're going to cheat, if they're trying to try to prevent even the fragile truce that we've set up from taking place, then they're not going to be happy.
"Because what the President has also shown is that we still have clear military, diplomatic and maybe most importantly, we have extraordinary economic leverage.
"So the President has told us not to use those tools. He's told us to come to the negotiating table.
"But if the Iranians don't do the exact same thing, they're going to find out that the President of the United States is not one to mess around. He's impatient. He's impatient to make progress."