Can Pakistan broker a US-Iran breakthrough? Hormuz tolls and uranium remain sticking points

The latest US message in negotiations was relayed to Iranian counterparts by Pakistan two days ago, and Islamabad’s minister Naqvi held another round of talks with Iranian counterparts after visiting Tehran twice this week, Tehran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency reported.

However, sticking points remain, including a consensus over Iran’s nuclear programme, over 400 kg of enriched uranium, and transit through the Strait of Hormuz, which is a key waterway for the shipment of oil, gas, fertiliser and other petroleum products.

US forces have been blocking Iranian ports since mid-April and have redirected 85 commercial ships until Monday, US Central Command said.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on Friday that “some good signs” had been seen in talks, but no resolution could be reached if Tehran goes ahead with enforcing the tolling system for commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz, which remains effectively closed since February 28 after the war broke out.

“There’s some good signs. I don’t want to be overly optimistic… So, let’s see what happens over the next few days,” Rubio said.

The US secretary added that no country in the world should accept Iran’s tolling system being introduced in the key waterway, as Tehran has potentially convinced Oman to join the tolling mechanism for commercial ships transiting the strait.

President Trump on Thursday said America will recover Iran’s highly enriched stockpile of uranium, which the Trump administration has said will allegedly be used for making a nuclear weapon, but Tehran has said that uranium’s usage is purely for peaceful purposes.

During an interaction with reporters at the White House, the US president said, “We will get it. We don’t need it, we don’t want it. We’ll probably destroy it after we get it, but we’re not going to let them have it.”

This comes as Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei had said the enriched uranium should not be sent abroad.