Countries must reject Iran’s efforts to control Hormuz, UN agency document says

By Reuters 10 July 2026, 4:35 pm

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Countries should reject efforts by Iran to impose sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz and Tehran’s “unilateral decision” to create a body to control traffic through the waterway, the UN shipping agency’s governing council resolves.

The agreement comes as the US and Iran have exchanged hostilities this week, including US airstrikes, prompted by attacks on ships that Washington said Tehran carried out.

The attacks renewed concerns about the recovery of global oil shipping and highlighted the fragility of the countries’ interim truce.

Protection of vital shipping lanes was discussed at a session this week of the UN’s London-based International Maritime Organization’s 40-member governing council. Gulf countries, the United States and Iran clashed over the future of the strait.

The IMO Council “strongly condemns” Iran’s decision to “establish an entity purporting to control traffic through the strait,” according to the text of the non-binding decision.

The Council decision calls upon member states not to recognize “Iran’s claim of sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz, its assertions of jurisdiction over the maritime zones of third states in and around the strait, which violated the sovereignty, sovereign rights and exclusive jurisdiction of these states” and not to recognize any Iranian decisions aimed at “closing, obstructing, hampering or otherwise interfering with international navigation and the right of transit passage.”

Iran’s recently created Persian Gulf Strait Authority said in an advisory last month that no vessel was permitted to pass through the waterway “without a valid passage permit” issued by the body.

Iran, which does not have a seat on the Council, told IMO delegates this week it rejected “the selective, politically motivated and legally unfounded allegations” made against it. It added that its steps are meant to “safeguard Iran’s sovereignty and vital security interests,” and “do not constitute the closure of the strait.”