UN maritime body counts 19 seafarer deaths since start of Iran’s Strait of Hormuz blockade

The UN’s International Maritime Organization says it has counted 68 incidents and 19 seafarer deaths in the Strait of Hormuz as of Friday, since Iran’s blockade of the waterway in late February.

The latest incident on the list was on August 17, when a projectile struck the engine room of the Liberian-flagged Minoan Dignity, killing one crewmember.

According to Windward, a maritime traffic tracking firm, the crewmember was the ship’s chief engineer.

Iran says US economic sanctions are a ‘declaration of war’ on all nations

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei says new US sanctions against Iran go far beyond an illegal economic war on a single nation, characterizing them as a “declaration of war” against all governments, according to remarks carried by Iran’s Fars news agency.

The announcement of new sanctions represents “an attempt by the United States to exert extraterritorial sovereignty over all independent UN member states”, Baghaei said.

“No government has the right to force foreign banks, enterprises, or airports, each operating under the exclusive jurisdiction of their own sovereignty, to refrain from engaging in legitimate trade with a third country.”

He argued that “such secondary sanctions have no basis in international law”, adding that they “violate the fundamental principle of sovereign equality enshrined in Article 2, Paragraph 1 of the UN Charter”.

Baghaei characterized economic coercion as an “international offence and a wrongful act”, warning that combining sanctions with a naval blockade “reduces the sovereignty of other states to something temporary and conditional upon the whims and caprices of another power”.

Yielding to such intimidation, Baghaei added, would lead to “the total erosion of national sovereignty” and serve as “a catastrophic return to blatant, full-scale colonialism”.

Trump’s economic ‘D-Day’ on Iran unlikely to yield intended outcome

Ross Harrison, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, says Trump’s use of military terminology like “D-Day” to describe economic pressure on Iran is unlikely to force Tehran to capitulate.

Harrison said that Iranians have already been living in an economic “D-Day” since maximum pressure sanctions were reimposed after the US withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal.

“I think the D-Day is language Trump is using because the military campaign failed to create the kind of conditions on the ground that would get the Iranians to capitulate,” Harrison said.

“I think he’s using that language in order to transfer military language to economic language, but in terms of actually creating the kind of outcome that he plans or hopes for, I’m quite skeptical,” he argued.

Harrison added that China remains the most significant source of support for Tehran, but targeting that connection carries major risks for Washington.

“I think the biggest lifeline that could be given to Iran would come from China,” he said. “And the question is not really the policing; the question is whether the United States is willing to pay the price of derailing US-Sino relations now, when China also has levers of power that they could inflict upon the United States and because there’s a looming summit between President Xi and Donald Trump in Washington next month.”

“So, it’s not a matter of policing; I think it’s a matter of whether the US is willing to go to the mat and pay the price of disrupting a relationship that Donald Trump seems to be leaning on right now,” he said.

‘We’re seeing what happens’ on sanctions for Iran, says Trump

US President Donald Trump has repeated claims that Iran is weakened economically and militarily, asserting the country “would love” to make a deal with Washington.

However, Iran’s foreign minister responded on social media, writing that Trump’s plans for economic warfare are “bound to fail”.

More comments on Iran from Trump during a South Carolina campaign rally supporting Senator Darline Graham.

• “When a country doesn’t any longer have a Navy, an Air Force, radar, technical equipment, manufacturing, their leaders are gone, their second set of leaders are gone, parts of their third set of the leaders are gone. In fact, it’s actually one of my biggest problems; I don’t know who the hell to deal with.”
• “It’s a problem. It’s the only country in the world where nobody wants to be president. They say, ‘Who wants to be president?’, ‘Oh, no, I don’t want to be president.’ So, it’s a little bit of a problem,” he said.

Iran facing economic pressure, diplomatic deadlock

Rob Geist Pinfold, a senior non-resident fellow at the Gulf International Forum, says Iran is facing “twin problems” as the US threatens further sanctions, but at the same time “diplomacy has clearly not worked” for Iran.

“The memorandum of understanding has obviously recently expired, and it has not got Iran to where it wants to be. Nor has it, of course, got the US where it wants to be. So, Iran finds itself in a conundrum at the moment,” Pinfold said.

“The regime has never been a unitary act; there are different individuals and different groups within the Iranian regime who have different visions or solutions to the problems that Iran faces,” he said.

Pinfold added that the Iranian government is internally dealing with competing interests and is divided on whether it’s time to return to war or give diplomacy a chance.

“There’s no clear answer here, so yes, there’s economic pressure, but negotiations and diplomacy have not delivered the result that either Iran or the US wants,” he said.

US energy secretary touts ongoing oil shipment figures through Strait of Hormuz

US Energy Secretary Chris Wright says the US military helped ship more than 15 million barrels of oil and other products out of the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday.

Combined with pipelines, the total oil leaving the region was close to 20 million barrels, he said on X.

The seven-day average of oil leaving the strait is now more than eight million barrels a day, Wright added.

“Make no mistake, thanks to the US Navy, oil is flowing through the Strait of Hormuz,” he said.

His remarks come amid Iran’s ongoing efforts to block shipping through the critical waterway since February.

The eight million barrels per day figure Wright cited as the latest seven-day average is still less than half of the daily average before the war.

"..more than 15 million barrels ... on Tuesday"

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Commercial traffic through Strait of Hormuz remains at just 20 percent of pre-war levels, report reveals

Commercial traffic through the Strait of Hormuz remains heavily suppressed, with daily transits hovering in single digits due to ongoing Iranian military activity and maritime security risks, according to research from the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO).

Despite persistent IRGC harassment, including UAV overflights, VHF hailing and active mine danger areas, UKMTO said that 103 ships entered the strategic waterway and 89 departed over the past week. However, the combined total represents only around 20 percent of the pre-war seven-day average.

Tanker traffic continues to dominate movements through the Strait, accounting for 45 percent of all traffic, the report found.

The southern Omani route remains the highest-risk corridor, accounting for 16 of 18 projectile strike incidents reported by UKMTO since July 6.

Georgia refuses to join EU sanctions against Iran, citing national interests

Georgia has declined to join the latest sanctions adopted by the European Union against Iran, declaring that its international political actions are guided exclusively by national interests, reports the Georgian news agency Interpressnews (IPN).

Ruling Georgian Dream member of parliament Tengiz Sharmanashvili said that Georgia will not support any policy that runs counter to its own national priorities.

“Whether Georgia will join any resolution or take steps related to international politics is determined by only one criterion: whether it is in Georgia’s interests at that moment or not,” Sharmanashvili said.

He added that if a decision contradicts those interests, “we do not care at all whose interests it serves afterwards”, according to the IPN report.

Iran navy commander says defense industry strengthened under sanctions

Rear Admiral Shahram Irani, Iran’s navy commander, says the country’s defense industry has become a key pillar of national security after developing under years of sanctions and external pressure, according to Iran’s Mehr news agency.

Marking National Defense Industry Day, he said Iran had chosen “the path of relying on domestic capabilities, internal knowledge and national will”, building a defence industry that had become “one of the main pillars” of the country’s security and strength.

He added that Iran’s domestic defence capabilities had played “a decisive role in maintaining the balance of power”, increasing its offensive capabilities and thwarting what he described as the objectives of its adversaries.

Iran’s army says any attack will face ‘broader’ response

Iran’s military doctrine is shifting from a “defensive” to an “offensive” posture following lessons learned from recent wars, army spokesman Brigadier General Mohammad Akraminia has said, according to Iranian state media.

“Our country’s military doctrine was defensive in the past, but gradually during these two wars, we witnessed the military doctrine moving from a defensive posture towards an offensive one,” Akraminia said.

He stressed that the change “does not mean carrying out preemptive operations against the enemy,” adding: “We will respond to any act of aggression immediately and on a broader scale than the aggression itself.”

Akraminia said Iran had repaired military systems damaged during earlier fighting and introduced new systems into service. “We are working continuously so that if the enemy again makes a miscalculation, we can deliver a more crushing response than before,” he said.

He also said recent command restructuring was aimed at improving the speed of Iran’s military response. “Since we entered a state of ceasefire and silence, we have tried not to lose a single moment because we do not trust the enemy at all,” he said.

Akraminia added that the Strait of Hormuz had gained “decisive geopolitical influence” in advancing Tehran’s foreign policy objectives after the war, and described the recent Saudi-Turkish-Pakistani defence partnership as an indication of declining US influence in the region.

Iran says its defensive weapons production doubled in past year

Iran’s defensive weapons production has doubled over the past year, according to Reza Talaei-Nik, spokesman for the Ministry of Defence and Armed Forces Logistics.

“Our defence weapons production rate has doubled in the past year, from July of last year to July of this year,” Talaei-Nik said, according to the Tasnim news agency.

He said weapons and ammunition used on the battlefield were being rapidly replaced, with production continuing alongside the deployment of domestically manufactured equipment.

Talaei-Nik also said Iran had limited military exhibitions and weapons unveilings to reduce vulnerabilities and “surprise the enemy”.

“The only way to resist hegemony and confront foreign powers that target the country’s independence, existence and identity is to become stronger and more powerful,” he said.

Iran’s Ghalibaf claims US put regional allies at risk ‘for the sake of Israel’

Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s parliament speaker and top negotiator, says Tehran has received “numerous messages” from neighbouring countries about shaping new security arrangements and expanding economic cooperation in the region.

“The United States put the security of every single one of its allies at such risk through bullying and pure disregard for their interests for the sake of Israel that they briefly saw their entire existence on the line,” Ghalibaf said in a post on X.

“A homegrown, independent order is what will actually deliver peace and security,” he added.

1. Netanyahu started to create the chaos on June 13, 2025
2. He vowed
3. The war in 2026 is the resumption of the 12-day war of June 2025.
4. Trump declared war on Iran while ignoring the fact that he made allies in the Gulf region co-belligerent, as attacks on Iran were facilitated from US bases in the host countries. Some of these countries were also directly involved.

Recovery at one of four damaged refineries in South Pars gas field reaches 70%, Iran says

Recovery of production capacity at the Phase 14 refinery in Iran’s South Pars gas field is 70 percent complete and is expected to be finished by the end of the Iranian calendar year, state-owned Pars Oil and Gas Company CEO Touraj Dehqani said.

Dehqani said reconstruction began immediately after the refinery was hit during the 12-day war in June last year, according to Iran’s Oil Ministry news agency SHANA.

Dehqani added that reconstruction was also under way at the third and fifth South Pars refineries, which he said sustained the heaviest damage among four affected facilities.

He said initial estimates suggested a full rebuild could take at least three years, but authorities are now aiming to complete the overall reconstruction within two years.

US, Israel no longer ‘centre’ of Middle East, Iran’s Basij chief claims

Hossein Taeb, the head of Iran’s internal security paramilitary unit, the Basij, says the global balance of power is shifting, and that the United States and Israel are “in one of their weakest positions”.

“Today, the map of global power is changing. It is no longer the case that the United States is the centre of the world and the Zionist regime the centre of the region,” Taeb said, according to the Tasnim news agency.

He said European countries had realized they had been “humiliated” by Washington, arguing that Europe’s weakened position was also reflected in the Trump administration’s national security strategy.

Taeb warned Iranians against being “deceived” by what he described as an apparent return by Iran’s adversaries to negotiations. “The Iranian nation should not be deceived by this apparent return to the negotiating table,” he said.

He accused Iran’s adversaries of failing to fulfill those commitments and instead returning to “breach of promises and pressure”.

Taeb claimed that economic problems in the US and Israel were among the factors weakening what he described as the “front of arrogance”.

Egypt, Iran discuss regional de-escalation, MoU

A statement by the Egyptian Foreign Ministry says its Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty and his Iranian counterpart Abbas Araghchi reviewed over the phone the overall situation in the region and ongoing efforts “to create an environment conducive to de-escalation”.

It added that the two also discussed a “return to the diplomatic path – whether regarding the negotiation track between Oman and Iran or the resumption of the implementation of the US-Iran memorandum with the ultimate goal of reaching a comprehensive and sustainable agreement that addresses various concerns and enhances regional security and stability.”

Abdelatty emphasized the importance of intensifying ongoing diplomatic efforts and initiatives to reduce current tensions and reach peaceful understandings that help restore security and stability in the region, the statement said.

Iran will not allow US ‘economic terrorism’ to undermine stability: First vice president

Iran’s First Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref has said the government will “not allow America’s economic terrorism to target the economic stability and livelihoods of the people.”

“The experience of the Islamic Revolution has shown that economic pressure is incapable of altering the will of the Iranian nation and instead yields the opposite result,” the official said on X.

Trump failed knowing Iran’s defense policies

Iranian commanders are reviewing new military strategies as the US threatens further economic sanctions.

According to Iranian military and government figures, the country has ramped up its production of weapons and defensive equipment. However, they are choosing not to showcase them in order to surprise the US and protect their defensive secrets.

The US says more than 85 percent of Iran’s defence-industrial base has been destroyed, but Iran is said to have continued to produce weapons in underground bases even as other manufacturing sites have been destroyed.

Trump’s ‘recklessness’ has made world want to acquire nuclear weapons, says Iran’s security chief

Iran’s Tasnim news agency reports, quoting Supreme National Security Council Secretary Mohsen Rezaei, “Trump’s recklessness, with his attacks on Iran, has increased the desire of people around the world to acquire nuclear weapons, especially when they saw that membership in the International Atomic Energy Agency and the [Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty] NPT was ineffective in preventing attacks from the United States.”

“Trump has created nuclear insecurity instead of nuclear security,” he continued. “Iran has accepted all international safeguards, has complied with them, is a member of the NPT, and has agreed to inspections. Iran is the only country that is ahead of all other countries in its commitment to nuclear regulations.”

Scientists in Nazi Germany managed to create a fission but Hitler showed no interest. So, they stopped their research.

Albert Einstein came aware of this development and warned Washington. The Americans rushed with their secret nuclear Manhattan Project they where working on since 1942.

When the existence of this secret project became public it triggered the Cold War in 1947, and the rise of nuclear powers including the Israelis who got "interested" in the secret project in 1956 because the nuclear project was by three Jews.

But yes, if one wishes to speak in terms of the Iranian view, the invention of nuclear militarization is by the Americans and the first and only nuclear genocide have led directly to the killing of an estimated 110,000 to 210,000 people from the initial blasts, intense heat, and acute radiation sickness in Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the end of 1945

‘Whole world understood that Trump is a fool’: Iran’s security chief

Rezaei, Iran’s Supreme National Security Council Secretary, said Tehran must change its approach to the conflict with the US and its diplomatic conduct. “Iran today is not the same Iran as before the war,” he said, adding that the new military appointments by Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei indicate that Tehran intends to be prepared for war.

Khamenei also argued that the image of the US as a “peace-loving” nation in the minds of the Iranian youth had changed. “The whole world has understood that Trump is a fool,” he said.

Rezaei warns Iran’s neighbors against joining US economic war

Iran’s security chief has warned Gulf countries not to join the US in imposing economic measures against Iran, saying Tehran would target their interests in retaliation.

“If the countries surrounding Iran join the Americans in their economic war, not a drop of oil will leave the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz, and we will also target other oil export routes from the Persian Gulf,” he said.

Rezaei also claimed that Trump had been persuaded by Netanyahu to wage an economic war on Iran. He said Trump was skeptical of the idea, but that the Israeli prime minister had persuaded him to try the measure for two to three months and then evaluate whether to continue for six.

“The enemy is counting on division and disagreement,” he said, reaffirming Iran’s unity instead.

Countries are ‘taking different measures’ to secure trade via Strait of Hormuz

“It’s essential that the Strait [of Hormuz] be open to shipping without any threats from the IRGC sending drones and missiles against unarmed commercial ships anymore, or using mafia-like tactics as they appear to have done in Iraq”, Joey Hood, former acting director of the Office of Iranian Affairs at the US Department of State, says.

Hood said he does not believe Trump’s claim the US has control of the Strait; “obviously, the IRGC is capable of launching drones and missiles against unarmed ships practically whenever it wants to”, he said, adding that “this doesn’t mean that the world is going to sit still and allow that to happen”.

“Pipelines are being taken out of mothballs, or they’re being refurbished, or there are new ones being built. Kuwait just announced a $16 billion investment in a pipeline project, which would be financed by American companies,” he said, adding that the “UAE has been able to export as much oil through the Strait as they have before the war”.

“So countries are taking different measures; I think they’ll look different for every country, and not every country has the same abilities,” he said.

Iran’s foreign minister speaks with Pakistan’s army commander

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and Field Marshal Asim Munir, the commander of the Pakistani army, have discussed the latest regional developments in a phone call, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson says.

The two also spoke about “effective solutions to strengthen peace, stability, and security in the West Asian region”.

Pezeshkian says Iran hasn’t compromised on single clause of memorandum of understanding

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has said that Iran must decide to save itself from a situation of neither “war nor peace”.

“We signed the memorandum of understanding because we believe that we cannot achieve anything through war,” he said in a speech to mark Doctors’ Day, the IRNA news agency reports.

“We are not going to bow our heads and give in to the enemy. We can solve our problems with strength but with logic,” he added.

“In the Security Council, all those who had a hand in the fire believed that this was the best memorandum of understanding, and on that basis, we all signed it,” he said, adding, “There is not a single clause in the memorandum that we have compromised.”

Pezeshkian called for internal unity and cohesion, and said that the late Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei had “accepted that we must take this path to escape this situation”.

Two US tanker aircraft leave Bulgaria a month after deployment upset Iran

Two US tanker aircraft have left Bulgaria’s Bezmer airbase, Bulgaria’s defence minister said, nearly a month after their deployment in the Balkan country angered Iran.

The United States requested their temporary deployment under an agreement governing the joint use of military facilities.

Iran said at the time that their deployment would constitute complicity in “aggression and war crimes”, a charge that Sofia dismissed.

The two US Air Force KC-135 planes left Bulgaria yesterday, Defence Minister Dimitar Stoyanov told reporters.

There was no comment from US military authorities.

Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister responds to Western diplomats’ critique of Israel

Kazem Gharibabadi, Iran’s deputy foreign minister for legal and international affairs, says continuing to support Israel is a ‘deliberate choice’ by Western countries to participate in Israeli crimes.

In a post on X responding to a call made by former Western diplomats for their governments to “uphold international law in Palestine”, Gharibabadi said: “London and Paris should not hide behind the phrase ‘expressing concern’ from this situation.”

“Continuing to send weapons and providing any kind of support to the regime is a deliberate choice for collaboration and participation in the commission of crimes by the Zionist regime,” Gharibabadi wrote.

Earlier today, more than 100 people, including former British ambassadors to the UN and former directors for the Middle East at the French Foreign Ministry, signed a letter calling on their governments to work together to uphold international law in the Palestinian territory.

US energy secretary says US oil, gas production at ‘all-time high’

US Energy Secretary Chris Wright has hailed the US’s oil and gas production as global energy remains strained due to disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz.

“American oil and gas workers have driven production to an all-time high, making the US the world’s largest producer of oil and natural gas,” said Wright in a post on X.

Earlier, Wright also claimed the US military helped ship more than 15 million barrels of oil and other products out of the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday this week.

Production at 'all-time high' has no meaning when it grossly refer to the internal market. It says nothing about how it plays out on the global market.

When it comes to gas production, countries in Europe have been relying on the Gulf countries, like Qatar, for years due to long standing contracts, which exist long before the US began to export LNG.

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